Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Barry’s eating some suspicious-looking leftovers and watching TV. He’s not even sure when he last had chow mein, but it passed the smell test, so he’s wolfing it down before the slightly stale flavour catches up to him.

A rerun of Deep Space Nine is showing on TV, and his black cat Sildar is curled up on the sofa next to him. On screen, Sisko saves the day, as usual, and the credits roll, and Barry stands up, taking the empty Tupperware over to the bin.

The news immediately follows the show, and he’s only barely following as he washes his cutlery. There’s something about a local spelling bee, a couple of missing cats, a kid doing a bake sale for charity, and a ninety-year-old arrested for doing 120 in a 30.

“Slow news day, huh, Sildar?” He says, petting his head. Sildar purrs and then jumps down from the counter, nudging his empty food bowl. “Yeah, yeah, I get it, bud,” he says. “Subtlety isn’t in your vocabulary, huh?”

“And now, on to our main story of the night,” the newscaster says. “An experimental rocket launched from the Faerun Military Base has crashed only ten miles from town. The site has been locked down by the military, but the question remains: should the Base be allowed to launch dangerous prototypes so close to the town? We ask residents after this.” The show cuts to adverts.

“Prototype rockets,” Barry says, dismissively, as the Fantasy Costco theme plays over the TV. “That’s what they always say when it’s aliens, right, Sildar? That or weather balloons.”

Sildar mews pathetically, somehow managing to give the impression that he’s not been fed in years, even though Barry distinctly remembers feeding him that very morning.

“Okay, okay,” Barry says, reaching for a tin of cat food. “You’re really not interested unless there’s food, are you?”

He tips the tub into Sildar’s bowl, and Sildar immediately starts stuffing his face. Barry rolls his eyes.

He’s sticking the tin in the recycling when he hears the noise from outside. His head snaps up, and his blood runs cold as he stands perfectly still, waiting to see if the noise will come again.

When it does, he’s not sure how to react. It’s a sound like someone’s walking on the gravel outside, trying to keep quiet but stumbling.

Should he call the cops? Someone’s trespassing, even if they don’t intend to rob him, but what if it’s just a fox or something? He lifts a corner of the blind and peeks out into the darkness, and he’s just in time to see someone slip round the back of his garage. Well, shit.

He grabs his wall phone and dials 911.

“Hi, uh, police, please,” he says quietly.

There’s a moment as he’s connected, and then the dispatcher says, “what’s your emergency?”

He describes that someone’s walking around outside, and gives his address. The dispatcher tells him to stay inside, turn the lights out, hide somewhere if it sounds like they’re coming in.

Honestly, Barry’s not too worried. Whoever it was didn’t come anywhere near the house, so they probably saw the lights on and decided to rob the garage, which is a separate building. It suggests they aren’t violent, and they don’t want a confrontation, and, anyway, it’s not as if he’s got anything valuable stored out there.

Then he notices that Sildar’s disappeared.

His food is almost untouched, and that’s unheard of. Maybe he’d been spooked by the noise? Then, in an instant, the news flashes back into his head – the missing cats. What if there’s an abductor? Shit. If Sildar went outside, they could grab him.

He heads back into the front room, but Sildar isn’t there either. He rushes to the front door and, sure enough, the cat flap is unlocked.

He bites his lip so hard he tastes blood. He’s gonna have to head outside and look. He can’t let whoever this person is take his cat. He pulls on his shoes, and opens the door a crack, peeking outside. No movement.

He takes a step out, whisper-calling Sildar’s name. No response. He walks back inside quickly, reappearing with the cat’s food bowl in his hand. Normally, that’d be enough to have Sildar appearing from wherever he’s hiding, but there’s not a sound.

Shit. He’s gonna have to check the garage.

He tries to walk quietly across the gravel, but he’s sure whoever it is hiding round there can hear him coming a mile away. “Sildar!” He calls again, a little louder this time, but there’s still no movement.

Should he wait for the cops? He doesn’t really want to get murdered. But Faerun is a small village, and the police station is in the next town over – they could be half an hour or more. Especially when they’re responding to a call that’s basically “I thought I saw a dude.” Barry imagines it’s probably not the highest-priority case they’ve ever had, especially on a night that a rocket crashed outside of town. If this person is trying to kidnap his cat, the cops could be far too late.

He swallows, and resolves to just peek round the corner. He walks on tiptoes right up to the corner and holds his breath, and peeks round.

He sees a lot, in that quick glance. There’s a motion-activated light round this side of the garage, which is already on, and so he gets a good look at the elvish woman, slumped over on the floor, covered in blood. He doesn’t see Sildar.

His jaw drops, and he whips his head back around the corner. He freezes for a second, and sticks his head around the corner once more to confirm what he thought he saw, and, sure enough, there she is – hunched over, clutching at a wound on her stomach.

She must hear him, because she looks up, and they make eye contact. She looks scared, so scared, and as he watches she tries to stand, attempting to pull herself up on the wall of the garage, but she’s so weak from her wound she can’t, and she collapses back to the floor.

“Shit, are you okay?” He says, stepping fully into the light now. She backpedals away desperately, one hand still clutching at the wound on her stomach. He steps back, bringing his hands up in what he hopes is a nonconfrontational manner. “Woah, it’s okay, I won’t hurt you. I’ve got a first aid kit in the house -”

Something about her is odd, he thinks. There’s no recognition on her face as he speaks, as if she doesn’t understand common. Who doesn’t speak common? It’s the dominant language globally, where could she possibly be from that she doesn’t speak it?

He glances at her ears.

“I - not hurt you.” He says, in broken, high-school elvish.

Her eyes widen in recognition. “You speak elvish?” She sounds exhausted, pained, as if even the exertion of speaking is agony.

“Badly,” he says. “You - I call for help. Doctors.”

“No!” She says vehemently, shaking her head for emphasis. “You can’t, please.”

He’s paralysed. This is such a shitty trope, some part of his brain is shouting at him. They always say that in movies just before the hapless sidekick has to sew up the protagonist. He can’t sew at the best of times, let alone when there’s blood everywhere!

“I - can’t help you,” he tries to explain, with his limited vocabulary.

“Please, take me inside,” she says. “I’ll be okay, I just need rest.”

He nods, mutely, and grabs her by the arm, helping her to her feet. She slings an arm over his shoulder, leaning with most of her weight on him.

“Why no doctors?” He asks.

She’s silent, gritting her teeth as every step sends shockwaves up her body.

“You - speak no common?”

She ignores him again, and he pushes the door open with his foot, guiding her into the front room. He helps her sit on the couch, wincing a little as he sees the blood from her wound drip onto the felt.

“I can’t see a doctor,” she says.

“Why?”

“They - uh, I’m scared of them? A phobia?” She tries.

He shakes his head. He’s never heard the elvish for phobia before, but he’s got it from context. “That’s - you might die. Uh, there is lots of blood.”

“Do you have bandages?” She dodges the question implicit in his tone.

“Yes, one minute,” He runs out of the room to grab the first aid kit by the door.

“I - I will get doctors if you do not explain,” he says, as he reenters the room. “You might die,” he says again, as he leans down to inspect the wound. She pulls her shirt up enough for him to get at it. It’s not as bad as he’d thought; it’s not very deep, and he thinks it should be okay with just a bandage, which makes him feel a lot better. He cleans it up with some antiseptic wipes, being sure to wipe away the mud. She flinches every time he comes near her, but she allows the touch.

“I just need sleep.”

He cocks his head. “Elves do not sleep,” he says.

She bites her lip and avoids his gaze, looking worried, and he realises he’s caught her in a lie. He can’t work out what, though – why would she say she needs sleep? Surely everyone knows elves meditate, and she’s an elf!

“I do,” she says. He starts to wind the bandage around her abdomen as she speaks. “I - am not from here,” she says.

Oh. Is she an illegal immigrant? He grinds his teeth. That does complicate things. He doesn’t want to turn her over to be deported.

“Where from?” He asks, trying to get a better handle on what she’s saying.

She thinks for a solid minute, and finally, reluctantly, says a word he doesn’t understand. His face must betray his confusion, because she tries a different word, and then a third. Finally, she just points straight upwards.

He furrows his brow. What does she mean? What’s upwards – oh, shit.

The prototype rocket, from the military base. It really was – it was –

“Not earth?” He asks, feeling silly. “You came from – uh, other place? Other, uh, planet!” He has to really dig deep in his memory for that last word.

She nods, pressing her lips together in a tight line.

“We’re related – uh, like family – to your elves. A common ancestor,” she says. He doesn’t know a couple of the words, but he gets the gist.

He swallows, suddenly feeling like a fish out of water. He’s breathing hard and fast. Fuck, is he having a panic attack? He’s not had those since he was a kid.

He gulps it down, managing to bring his breathing back under control.

“Okay,” he says. “You are - friendly?”

She smiles, and he notices how sharp her teeth are. Much sharper than an Earth elf’s. Despite this, it’s a warm kind of smile, and Barry finds himself smiling a little too.

“Would I say no?” She looks positively mischievous. “Even if I was here to subjugate all humans, I’m totally reliant on your kindness.” He chuckles, and she lapses back into silence for a minute. “What’s your name?”

He finally stands, having tied off the bandage. “Barry. What is yours?”

“Lup,” she smiles. “Thank you, Barry.”

He looks at her and realises for the first time that she’s absolutely fucking gorgeous, even covered in mud and blood. He’s just about to reply, when the doorbell rings.

Oh, shit. The cops.

Chapter Text

“Hi, officer,” he says, desperately trying to play it cool while not looking like he’s trying to play it cool.

“Yeah, you rang about a disturbance?”

“Oh, actually,” he smiles, trying to look disarming and not nervous. “I think it was just a fox or something.”

The officer cocks his head. “You, uh, you said you saw someone outside.”

“Yeah, I don’t know. Trick of the light.”

The officer looks suspicious, and Barry doesn’t blame him. He’s a shitty liar.

“Or maybe there was someone here and they left, I don’t know. I’ve not heard anything since I made the call, though.”

That seems to allay some of the cop’s suspicion. “Well, I’ll have a quick look around anyway, if you don’t mind. Where did you see this person?”

“Uh, round the back,” Barry indicates the corner of his house furthest away from the garage. He really doesn’t want this cop seeing the puddle of blood Lup left where she’d been slumped.

The cop nods. “Stay indoors, I’ll be back in a moment.”

He puts one hand on his firearm, the other shining a flashlight out in front of him, and walks round the corner. Barry’s thankful he had the presence of mind to draw the curtains in the front room so the officer doesn’t see the elf bleeding out all over his couch.

“Hey, I did find something,” the officer calls as he strolls back round the corner. Barry’s breath catches in his throat, his heart skips a beat. What had he seen? Had Lup opened the curtains? Had he found some blood, or a footprint, or -

“This little guy yours?” The cop says, holding Sildar in his arms.

“Oh, shit, Sildar!” Barry exclaims, carefully stepping down in just his socks from the front step onto the gravel to grab him. “I was worried about you, bud.”

“He was hiding out in the bushes. Something spooked him, maybe your intruder,” the cop says, handing Sildar over. “Sir, honestly, I can check back tomorrow morning if you’d like, but there really is no evidence anyone’s been here. So, if you’re happy, I’ll be off.”

Sildar purrs, snuggling into Barry’s arms.

“Oh, no, it’s not a problem. I can’t thank you enough for coming to check. Makes me feel safer,” Barry says, petting his head.

“No problem, sir,” the officer says, and he gets back into his car and pulls slowly out of Barry’s drive.

Barry breathes an enormous sigh of relief, and locks up, this time making sure to also lock Sildar’s cat flap. He doesn’t want the cat getting out again tonight. He’s not sure his nerves could handle it. He walks back into the front room with Sildar still in his hands, which is when Sildar goes absolutely apeshit.

The cat gets one look at Lup and immediately goes insane. He scratches at Barry’s arm, hissing, his fur standing up on end. Barry drops him in surprise, and the cat darts out of the room and up the stairs.

Lup looks terrified. Barry wasn’t sure if he’d believed she was really an alien, up until that moment, but her fear and confusion was far too real to be faked. “What - what the fuck was that?”

“Shit, uh, Sildar. My cat.” She looks blank. “A pet?”

“Oh,” she frowns. “Does it always do that?”

He laughs. “No, I think he is scared of you.”

She cracks a little smile, and even that is stunning. Are all aliens gorgeous, or just Lup? Her smile fades quickly, though, and she looks serious.

“Barry, I – I want to say, uh. You don’t have to hide me here. I understand that – that this might not be safe for you. I’d - I’d understand if you wanted me to leave.”

He’s shocked. “No, I – you are bleeding. You can not leave.”

She smiles, looking immensely grateful, like a load has been lifted off her shoulders. “I will only need a few days. I’ll leave as soon as I’m better. If that’s okay with you?”

He nods. “Yes, that is fine.” She smiles and stretches, bringing her arms above her head, wincing as she forgets the wound on her stomach. “Why are you here – uh, on earth?”

She looks reluctant, and just as she opens her mouth, her stomach rumbles, and he realises that he’s forgotten his manners. “Uh, are you hungry? What do you eat?”

“Anything elves here eat should be fine,” she says. “Vegetables and meat mostly. Cheese? It is, uh, aged milk?”

“We have cheese,” he grins.

“And zorp?”

“Zorp?” He rolls the word around in his mouth. “What is it?”

“A type of bug? It is enormous, four feet tall,” she says. “It is a delicacy.”

He desperately tries not to show his revulsion – he doesn’t want to insult her – before he sees the shit-eating grin she’s sporting, and he realises he’s being fucked with. “Very funny.” He pulls out a chicken curry in a Tupperware – more leftovers, that he’d been saving for tomorrow. On a whim, he grabs a hunk of gorgonzola he’d been keeping. “This is restaurant food. I did not make it. I am not a good cook.” He sticks the curry on a plate, putting a knife and fork with it and grabbing her a glass of water.

She tucks in ravenously, and he starts to feel bad for making her wait so long before he offered. When she’s done with the whole plate, she looks up at him, catching him watching her. She immediately looks aghast. “I’m so sorry, this – were we meant to share this?”

“No, it is fine.” He smiles. “I am glad you enjoyed it. I have a dessert for you.” He holds out the wedge of blue cheese he’d grabbed from the fridge. “A delicacy from Earth.”

Now she’s in the position of trying to contain disgust. “Is this mould?”

“It’s tasty.”

She analyses his face. “You’re fucking with me, yeah? Revenge for the zorp comment?”

It’s his turn to pull a shit-eating grin, and she smiles too for a second, thinking she’s found him out, before he takes a big bite. Gorgonzola is a little strong for him to eat raw, honestly, but it’s worth it to see Lup’s face. She visibly runs through all five stages of grief in a matter of seconds.

“Try some,” he says, his mouth still full. She gingerly takes the piece from him, and nibbles a corner that’s not too blue.

She coughs, spitting the chunk into her hand. She sticks her tongue out, her face screwed up in disgust. “Barry, it’s revolting. You eat this?”

He laughs, nearly choking on his own mouthful of cheese. She snatches the glass of water out of his hand and gulps it down. “Is that what all earth cheese tastes like?”

“No, that was quite – extreme. I will get something else.”

He stands up and grabs her now-empty Tupperware, as well as the knife and fork she’d used, walking back out to the kitchen. He grabs some cheddar out of the fridge, as well as a chocolate cupcake and a can of Coke that he’d been saving for his own dessert.

“Here,” he says, pointing at the cheese, “cheddar. It is nicer, I promise.”

“At least it’s not mouldy this time,” she says, a cheeky grin on her face as she takes a tentative bite. “Mm, this is much better.”

He lets her finish off the cheese, and then he hands her the cupcake. “This is sweet. A cake.” He shows her the tin, and illustrates how to drink from it, before cracking it open. “This is – uh, I do not know how to explain. It is tasty.”

She takes a little sip, scrunching up her nose a little as she does so. It’s adorable, Barry thinks. “It’s bubbly?” She says, in wonderment. “How do they make it hold the bubbles?”

“Uh, I cannot explain in elvish.”

She takes another sip. “It’s so sugary,” she says, and puts it down on the table. He takes that to mean she doesn’t care much for it.

She bites into the cupcake, making an appreciative noise. “This is delicious,” she says through a mouthful of it. “What’s in it?”

“Chocolate,” he says. “It’s a sugar product made from a bean. Everyone likes chocolate. Uh, it makes chemicals in your brain – uh, go.” He flushes as his inexperience with elvish is laid bare, but she just chuckles. It’s a nice sound, not at all mocking.

“I have some sparkling water, too,” he says. “And, uh, wine! Have you tried alcohol?”

She doesn’t like the sparkling water – she claims it tastes angry – or the wine, but he mixes her a quick and simple cocktail, and she seems to enjoy that. Thankfully, her species does have alcohol, so she’s not too knocked out by the tiny amounts he gives her. Barry only realises after she’s downed her cocktail that she maybe shouldn’t drink with a gaping wound, though.

Regardless, he pulls the couch out into a bed, and sets out the sheets. She snuggles down under the quilt, and she looks as if she’s going to fall asleep immediately, but she catches a glimpse of the TV, still running on mute.

“Barry, is this a news report?”

“Oh, uh, yes. They do one every hour,” he replies.

“Could you tell me what they are saying?”

He grabs the remote up off the floor, and hits the button to unmute it. “Uh, they are talking about a – a weapon, from the nearby military base. They – I think they must mean your ship? Is that how you got here?”

“Yes,” she says. “They don’t say it’s an alien ship?”

“No, they keep it secret. At least for now. I do not know if they will say in future. You are the first alien I have ever heard of.”

“Do they say anything about – about aliens at all?”

Barry listens for a second, but they’ve moved on to detailing the results of the Neverwinter Spelling Bee. “No,” he says.

She sighs a little, pulling the duvet up to her neck. “Thank you, Barry.”

He looks down at her in the dim light of the TV, and squints a little. She seems – upset?

“Are you okay?”

“I - have a lot to think about,” she says. “It is – different here.”

“What is your home like?” He asks, but immediately regrets it. If the military have compounded her ship, there’s probably no chance of her ever getting to leave earth.

Her face falls. “I - I will tell you tomorrow. I am tired.”

“Uh, of course, I’m sorry.”

He turns the TV off with the remote, and she rolls over away to face away from him. He thinks she might be crying, but what can he do? How could he possibly console her? He closes the door, but he stands with his back to it for a minute, not wanting to just leave her.

Eventually, after what seems like an age of paralysing indecision, Barry simply leaves.

And, somehow, they fall into a routine. Barry cleans and dresses her wound every day and tries to teach her some Common. In return, she helps him brush up on his elvish.

She never revisits the subject of her home, and he doesn’t bring it up. She’s restless, making him translate the news every day. She won’t tell him what she’s looking for, but she’s always disappointed, or maybe relieved? He’s not sure.

Her wound heals slowly, and she gets stronger every day, but it’s a week before she’s strong enough to walk around without his help, and another couple of days before she can do it without getting exhausted. Barry doesn’t know how fast a wound like hers is meant to heal, especially on an alien physiology.

What he does know is that he’s dreading the day she’s fully healed, because on that day, she’ll walk out of his life and he’ll never see her again.

Chapter Text

“Hey, Lup,” he says, as he comes in through the door, shrugging off his jacket. 

“Good evening, Barry.” 

She’s come along leaps and bounds in the ten days she’s been living at Barry’s. She claims she’s always been good at languages, and that Common isn’t that hard, but Barry’s still impressed. They even have simple conversations in Common without a single word of elvish sometimes. 

He slumps down on the couch next to her, dropping his car keys on the table. On screen, The Next Generation is on. Lup’s discovered a love of sci-fi, using elvish subtitles as an aid. 

“Barry, do you have any elvish books?” She asks, muting the TV. “I was hoping to find something to read while you’re at work. I’m getting pretty bored of Star Trek.”  

“Bored of Star Trek?” He chuckles. “Didn’t even think it was possible.” He takes a minute to consider. “I might be able to find you some. I don’t read elvish well enough to have ever needed books.”  

She nods, a little sadly, and turns back to the TV. She unmutes just in time to hear Picard say “engage!” 

“Would you -” she says, hesitantly. “Would you read to me?” He’s surprised she’d ask; the act seems somehow intimate, and she still flinches away from his touch. He’s got good at giving her extra personal space. She must see the surprise on his face, because she hurriedly adds, “you don’t have to, of course, I just -”  

“No!” Barry says. “Uh, it’s okay. I’d love to.”  

She looks relieved, happy. “Listen to my boy, using contractions. You sound just like a native.” She pauses a second. “Thank you,”  she says. 

“Oh, it’s okay,” he says, a little flushed. “Uh, where do you want to start? Wells? Asimov? Pratchett? He’s fantasy, not sci-fi, but it’s good -”  

“You can choose,” she grins. “I’ve never heard of any of them, so.”  

He jumps up and runs his finger along the shelf. Where to start? He’s got so many good books. 

He grabs The Colour of Magic, a Pratchett, and sits back down on the couch. He shows her the cover, delighting in the way she examines the intricate artwork, and then opens it to page one, and starts to read, a little more hesitantly than he’d like, because he’s still not totally up on his elvish. 

He gets a couple of chapters in, doing voices for each of the characters, her laughing at some of the jokes, him explaining pop culture references, having to ask for help on a tough word to translate occasionally. He sticks a bookmark in, and stands up, stretching his back out from the uncomfortable position he’d been hunched in. It’s an oddly relaxing experience, listening to her breathing softly as he reads, and he can feel the tension from his day at work has disappeared. 

“I’ll make dinner,” he says. 

“Okay,” she says. “You have a nice voice.”  

He’s not used to compliments; he lives alone with his cat (who still avoids Lup) and he works in a lab, which is hardly the most social of environments. That’s the reason he’s blushing, he tells himself. It’s not because it’s Lup complimenting him, just – shut up. 

“Oh, uh, thank you,”  he says. “So  do – uh, so do you.”  Oh my god, his brain shouts at him. What is this, eighth grade? 

She smiles, cutting off his train of thought. “Natch.”  

She’d had to explain what that one meant, but he liked it. It seemed very Lup – quietly confident, full of humour. 

“Help me up?” She says, holding out a hand. “Please?” She says, in Common. 

He grabs her arm, and she winces a little as she stands. 

“It still hurts?”  

“A little,” she says. “Can I help make dinner?”  

“Sure,” he says. “Can you cook?”  

“Can I?” she says, a massive grin on her face. 

As it turns out, she can. Barry quickly realises her culinary skill far outpaces his own, and his contribution is reduced to helping her cross the kitchen, ready to catch her if she stumbles. She seems to recognise most of the ingredients – another mystery about her home that he takes a mental note of – but occasionally she’ll quickly taste one before adding it to confirm it’s the flavour the dish needs. 

It’s only simple noodles, but it smells better than anything he’s ever cooked; better even than the takeaways he normally buys. 

“Enjoy,” she says, grinning, watching as Barry takes his first mouthful. 

“Oh, shit," he says, eyes wide. “It’s fucking good.”  

“Yeah, of course. Told you cha’gal could cook.” 

It’s sweet and sour in perfect measure, with a delicate blend of flavours Barry knows he couldn’t ever hope to replicate, even though he just watched her make it. “It’s amazing.”  

“You should see -” She says, seemingly without thinking about it, flinching as her brain catches up with her. “My - my brother. He’s a way better cook than me.”  

Barry gulps his mouthful down, a lump suddenly springing to his throat. Shit. 

“You - uh, you have a brother?”  

She nods mutely, aggressively wiping at her eyes with her sleeve. Oh, shit, is she crying? 

“Taako,” she says, sniffling. “ His name is Taako. I – we were on the ship together.”  

Barry jumps up from his seat at the table. He rounds the table, and hesitantly places a hand on her shoulder. She doesn’t flinch away from his touch, this time, instead leaning in to it. 

“Do you, uh – you don’t know where he is?”  

She sniffles again, louder this time. Good job, idiot, Barry berates himself, you sure know how to make a situation worse, huh? 

“I lost him in the crash. I – woke up, and I stumbled away, I don’t - I hardly even remember it, Barry,” she says, undeniably crying now, tears rolling down her cheeks. “I don’t know if he was still in the ship, or if – if he was even alive.”  

“Shuffle over,” he mutters, and she wipes at her eyes furiously again, before doing so. He sits down beside her, half on the chair, half off, and he wraps an arm around her shoulders. 

“I - I keep listening to your news, hoping – hoping they’ll say something about him, but also, if - if they don’t say, maybe it means he got away -”  she sobs. “I can’t - I can’t take not knowing.”  

He rubs a circle into her back. “Lup , I -”  

What can he say? He doesn’t have siblings; he can’t comfort her. He’s got no idea if Taako’s alive, no idea whether the military would announce if they captured a live alien or not. 

“I’m sure he’ll be okay,” he says. “I - you survived the crash, you made it out, I – he's got to have as well.”  

“That’s as bad, Barry,” she says. “He - he’s out there, alone, on this – this world we’ve never even seen before.”  He nods, mute. “He’s - he could be dead and I’d never know, or he could be alive and I’ll never see him again.”  

“You’ll see him again. I’m sure. I – I’m so sorry, Lup.”  

It sounds lame even as he says it, but what can he say? 

She leans into his hug, resting her head on his shoulder, and she cries as he holds her. 

======== 

It’s dark. So dark that it seems like his darkvision is failing him. 

He’s not sure where he is. He’d climbed out of the flaming wreckage and he’d run; he’d just run as far and as fast as he could, not thinking, not even – not even checking on Lup. 

Whether she’s dead or alive Taako doesn’t know. 

What he does know is that his clothes are bloody, but he’s not wounded. He tries to ignore what that implies. He knows that this planet’s military has closed off the site, and he can’t risk going back. He knows he can’t let anyone see him. 

He forces himself onwards, stumbling away, away from his sister, away from his only chance of getting home. 

Chapter Text

“Fuck,” he says. “Seriously?”  

He stares at the fax, suddenly furious.  

“And I’m the one who’s  gonna  have to report this,” he mutters to himself, scowling. He snatches up the paper, pulls on his jacket, and storms out, slamming his office door behind him.  

He gets in the elevator, pressing the button for the fiftieth floor – the Director’s office. Soft and soothing elevator music plays. It doesn’t calm him.  

The door slides open and he strides out walking straight through the waiting room, past all the people sitting, and knocking on her office door.  

“Ma’am, I’m sorry to have to bother you, but I have an urgent report,” he says, as the door is opened.  

“Come in,” the Director says, much to the subdued frustration of the people in the queue he’s just skipped. He steps into her plush office, all wood panelling and leather.  

“The  Faerun  police,” he says. “They had a report of a trespasser, only a couple of miles from the Site.” He doesn’t have to explain where he means. The Site seems is all anyone’s talking about at the Bureau. Anyone with the sufficient security clearance, anyway.  

“I’m sensing a ‘but’ here,” the Director says.  

“The incident was on the night of the crash. They waited two weeks to tell us. I’ve only just got the fax today.” He doesn’t need to elaborate – working with other agencies is the worst part of both their jobs; they have to navigate interagency jurisdictional squabbles and sheer incompetence.  

The Director scowls. “I hate working with local police. They damn well knew we were looking for a fugitive.”  

“I’ll send a team down there immediately, ma’am, I just thought you should know.”  

The Director thinks for a second, her face inscrutable. “No, Kravitz, go yourself. If anyone can find our alien, it’s you.”  

“Yes, ma’am,” he says, bowing slightly before heading out.  

Kravitz has to drive past the Site on the way to Faerun, so he figures it’s worth checking in on the way. It’s not as if there’s any urgency to the matter he’s investigating, not after two weeks.  

He pulls up, leaving the keys in the ignition. The only people around are Bureau employees; it’s not going to be stolen. He steps out and surveys the site.  

“Avi, how’s it going?” He says, stopping the man as he scurries past.  

“Oh, hey, Krav,” the man says. “It’s pretty amazing, I mean, I’ve got less than no idea how the rockets work. They don’t seem to use fuel, or propulsion, you know, it totally violates Newton’s Third Law as we understand it -”  

“Have the forensics crew found anything, yet?” Kravitz cuts him off.  Avi  is the Bureau’s rocket expert, a genius, but he sure is chatty.  

“They’ve been analysing the blood. Nothing really weird yet. Definitely alien, but they’re all excited about the similarities to elvish blood. They reckon a common ancestry could be on the cards.” Avi takes a swig from his hip flask. Kravitz fastidiously pretends not to see the man drinking on the job. “You know, I’m not so interested in biology. The rockets, though – this technology could take us to Mars!”  

“Why Mars? Not extra-solar?” Kravitz asks.  

“Oh, uh, no. No lightspeed capability. I’d say this is a  short-range  craft.”  

Kravitz reels slightly, although he’s far too professional to ever show it. “Avi, that’s - why haven’t you reported that?”  

“Uh, reported – that it’s  kinda  boring? That it took a real long time to get here?”  

“Avi, if it’s a short-range craft, where did it launch from?”  

Avi  looks blank for a second, before his eyes widen. “Oh, shit,” Avi says. “It’s definitely from inside our solar system, oh, shit.”  

“Tell the director, immediately,” Kravitz orders. “Tell her receptionist I said it was priority one.”  

“Oh, shit, man, I hate talking to her, she’s so scary -” Avi whines. Kravitz glares at him. “Okay, yeah, I’ll do it.”  

As huge a revelation as that was, Kravitz wasn’t responsible for any of that business. He’s a reclaimer, not an astronomer. What he was responsible for was hunting the fugitive alien who had been in that craft.  

He pulls up on the gravel driveway of the house behind another car – good news, it looks like someone’s home. It’s a decent distance from the ship, and he guesses that if the fugitive had been trying to avoid the  town,  they might’ve gone this way. He locks the car behind him and hops up on the doorstep, ringing the doorbell as he pulls out his ID.  

“Good afternoon, sir,” he says, flashing his shield as a slightly chubby man wearing glasses opens the door. “FBI.”  

He’s not really FBI, but the Bureau is so secret this guy certainly won’t have heard of it. The guy looks nervous, but most people do when they open the door to a badge.  

“Uh, hi, officer,” the guy says. “Uh, agent?”  

“Kravitz will do,” he says. “I’m here about the call you made two weeks ago, May seventeenth. Can I come in?”  

The guy’s eyes widen further, and he looks even more worried. Now Kravitz is suspicious; most people are pretty agreeable to FBI agents.  

“Uh, yeah, uh, sure,” he says, checking over his shoulder before he lets Kravitz in – a move Kravitz takes a mental note of.  

“What’s your name, sir?”  

“Uh, Barry  Hallwinter ,” the guy says. “Uh, do you want tea?”  

“No, thank you,” Kravitz says. “Okay, sir, this is a routine  follow-up , I’m just here to -”  

“A routine follow-up from the FBI?” The guy – Barry – interjects. Kravitz stops talking, not adjusting his facial expression in the slightest, just staring at him – a trick he’d learned from the Director. He’s watched it intimidate enough assholes to know it’s brutally effective. “Uh, sorry.”  

“I’m just here to ask a few questions that my colleague in the local police might’ve neglected,” Kravitz continues, as if Barry had never spoken. “I know it’s a while back, now, but your call could have a bearing on a case we’re investigating at the Bureau.”  

“Okay, shoot,” Barry says, a little nervously still.  

“First, what do you do for a living?”  

“Uh, I’m a senior researcher at the Faerun lab. Uh, biochemistry.” Kravitz nods.  

“Okay, can you tell me any distinguishing features of the person you saw?” He asks. “Human, elvish, dwarfish?”  

“Uh, I told the other officer I wasn’t sure if I saw anyone,” Barry says, still looking shifty. “Uh, probably human-sized, though.”  

“Which is it?” Kravitz says, maybe a little harsher than he’d normally be in an interview with a witness – the guy is hiding something, and Kravitz wants to know what. “You didn’t see anyone, or human-sized?”  

“Uh, well, uh – I thought I saw someone, but after I made the  call,  I didn’t see anyone, so, uh – I thought the person I saw was human-sized.”  

Barry’s looking incredibly uneasy, his eyes darting repeatedly towards the stairs.  

“Do you live here alone, sir?”  

“Uh, uh,” Barry’s spared from answering when a floorboard  creaks .  

“Is that someone now?”  

“Uh, yeah,” he mumbles, as whoever it is comes downstairs.  

“Barry, I – hello,” says an elvish woman, who, if Kravitz swung that way, he would describe as drop-dead gorgeous. Hell, he’s very gay and he can tell she’s a knockout.  

Something clicks in  Kravitz’s mind. Ah.  

This guy is an average-looking senior researcher, nervous about law enforcement being on his doorstep. He’s got a beautiful young woman in the house with him, but – Kravitz looks around – the décor is decidedly a  bachelor’s .  

This dude is sleeping with a junior researcher, Kravitz thinks to himself. Well, that’s none of Kravitz’s business; it’s not as if it’s illegal, just a little shady, and he’s only here about the call.  

“Hi,” he says. “I’m just asking Barry some questions ,   a n d   I ’ l l   b e   o u t   o f   y o u r   h a i r . ”  

She looks blank, confused, but that’s probably normal when your sugar daddy is being questioned by the FBI.  

Kravitz turns back to Barry again. “So, you didn’t get a clear look?”  

“No, uh, if there was  anyone,  they left quick.”  

Kravitz nods. Disappointing, but he’d pretty much expected it. “Mind if I poke around outside? I don’t expect to find anything, but it can’t hurt.”  

“No, of course. I’ll show you where I saw them.”  

Barry points Kravitz round the corner of his house. Kravitz spends a minute looking round – it’s only a small stretch of garden round this side of the house, so he’s done fairly quickly. He doesn’t find anything useful.  

“Okay,” he says to Barry, who’s still stood on the doorstep, “thank you again.” He jumps in his car, and turns the key in the ignition, but once it’s on he just sits for a second, thinking.  

Huh.  

Why was the fugitive heading that way? The way Barry saw his intruder heading was in the direction of the crash. They should’ve been headed the totally opposite direction, past his garage.  

Kravitz starts to reverse out of the driveway, still deep in thought. As he does, he spots Barry, nervously peeking out of his window at him.  

Something’s weird about this.  

Chapter Text

Barry blinks, bleary-eyed, and pats his bedside table for his glasses. He throws his sheets off, rolls his legs out of bed, and only then recognises the smell in the air.  

There’s a grin on his face as he walks downstairs to find  Lup  frying bacon. She’s wearing a pair of his pyjamas he’d lent her; they’re baggy and she’s rolled the sleeves up, but she still somehow manages to look amazing.  

“Oh! Barry,” she says. “ I - didn’t know you were awake. ”  

He smiles. “I o nly just got up. Want a coffee? ” Her species don’t have coffee, and Barry almost feels bad for introducing her to it, because she’s got absolutely hooked on caffeine.  

“Yes please!” She says, in common.  

He hits the switch on the coffee machine, and she scrapes the bacon out of the pan, dropping it onto a slice of bread and passing him the plate.  

He looks at her, dressed in his pyjamas, and he chuckles. “ You - maybe we should go shopping,”  he says, as he places a slice of tomato in his sandwich.  

She looks affronted, raising a hand to her chest in indignation. “ You don’t think I look good?”  

“Oh, no, no, uh,”  Barry stumbles over his words. “ I - I mean -”  

“I’m only kidding with you,  Barold ,”  she turns back to the pan, putting a couple of slices of bacon on for herself. “ I could use a manicure, have you seen my nails?”  

She flashes her nails at him. They look fine, in Barry’s inexpert opinion.  

“ Sure, uh, I was thinking more about some clothes. You can’t keep wearing mine.”  

“Well, I  can.  You’re just jealous I make ‘ em  look better than you.”  

He laughs. “ Yeah, that’s it.”  

She pulls her bacon out of the pan and assembles her own sandwich. “ Don’t be jealous, Bear, you look pretty good yourself.”  Is it his imagination or did her cheeks flush a little as she said that? He knows his own did.  

They finish up their sandwiches, and  Lup  goes to get changed into some actual clothes. They sit and watch the morning news, him translating – there’s no mention of Taako, and if he sees her wiping away some tears, he doesn’t mention anything.  

They decide to drive down to town, because  Lup’s  still slightly unsteady on her legs, and Barry doesn’t want her to have to make the  twenty-minute  walk. She’s definitely better, but she gets tired easily, so he grabs his keys and helps her into the passenger seat.  

She’s hardly been out of the house since she arrived, and it was dark last time she was out, so she’s practically glued to the window, her eyes wide, as she tries to take in all their surroundings.  

“ Is it – different to your home? ” He asks, tentatively, desperately curious but not wanting to upset her.  

“ Yes ,” she replies. “ My home is – nothing like this. There’s so much nature, here .”  

He’s absolutely fascinated. Her home doesn’t have many plants? And yet, she’s suited for an earth-like climate, and so she can’t be from a desert or an arctic world. Maybe she’s from a city?  

“ What - what’s it like? Your home?”  He sees her shoulder slump a little, and he hurriedly adds, “ you don’t have to say anything. I – sorry.”  

“ No, it’s okay,”  she says, still looking out the side window, not looking at him. “ It’s - I don’t know. My people are – lawful. They don’t like things to be disordered or chaotic, so they regulate everything. Life is structured. We –  Taako  and I – we hated it. So, one day, we just – left.”  

He nods. “ I get that. It’s - it’s not like that here, I hope.”  

“No,”  she says, looking at him again. “ None of my people would – they wouldn’t risk themselves to look after a stranger. You – I haven’t told you how much I appreciate everything you’ve done, Barry.”  

What can he say to that? “ Lup , it’s no problem, I – I've enjoyed having you here.”  

She smiles at him, and, once again, he’s struck by how beautiful she is.  

Barry pulls up into the bay and hurries round the other side of the car to help  Lup  out. “ Very chivalrous,”  she grins at him, before knitting her brows for a second in thought. “Should I talk in Common? Do people speak elvish here?” It still takes her a moment to translate what she wants to say into Common, but Barry’s impressed – she's picking the language up so fast.  

“Uh, people don’t really speak elvish. Maybe just – leave the talking to me?”  

She nods. “ Sounds good. Where should we go first?”  

He’s taken her into  Faerun’s  town centre. It’s a small town, and the shops are pretty much all lined up on Main Street. He’d been tempted to take her to the mall in Neverwinter, a couple of towns over, but he’d wanted to ease her into being around people. “ Uh, there’s a grocery store I need to visit. We need food. But, uh, you should probably be there for that, because you do most of the cooking.”  

“Okay,”  she says. “ Boring stuff out of the way first, I dig it. What next?”  

“Uh, there’s a clothes shop. No nail salon, so you can’t get your nails done, sorry.”  

She huffs dramatically. “ Well, Barry, what’s even the fucking point in coming out then?”  

He rolls his eyes. “ We can just walk down Main Street. See if anything catches your eye. And, later, we can grab coffee. I want you to meet someone.”  

They start to stroll, Barry walking much slower than he normally would so  Lup  doesn’t get tired. He enjoys watching her see everything for the first time; the neon signs, the window displays, the mannequins wearing fancy clothes. Her eyes are wide the whole way down the street, and he has to nudge her and whisper “ you’re staring,”  a few times as people pass the other way.  

They get to the grocery store, at the far end of the street, and Barry grabs a cart. As  Lup  watches, he finds the lactose-free milk and drops it in the cart. “ Can I just grab anything?”  She whispers.  

He grins. “Go wild.”  

She does. She disappears into the fruit aisle for five minutes, coming back with a dragon fruit, a pineapple, a bunch of bananas and some things even Barry can’t put a name to. She grabs half a dozen cheeses – none of them blue – to see which would taste best in her cooking. She keeps hiding Barry’s sparkling water, and he keeps putting it back in the cart. He finds her practically salivating at the smell of the freshly baked pizzas, so he scoops up one of those, too.  

She’s a force of nature, absolutely chaotic, and he can’t help but grin widely every time she bounds up to him, arms laden with more interesting-looking foods. Finally, though, he has to put his foot down.  

“ Lup , we’re  gonna  run out of fridge space if you’re not careful.”  

She scowls. “ I’ll put the spread back, then.”  She’d been under the impression that margarine was an ice-cream-like snack, and he could see how the confusion had arisen – the tubs do look the same.  

“ Take the cheddar too! We’ve got some at home!”  He calls after her, but it’s no good. She’s already disappeared round the corner.  

He chuckles to himself and checks his list. He’s pretty sure he’s got everything he came for, but it’s hard to tell, because the cart is literally overflowing with stuff. He pities the cashier who has to scan it all through, and he’s not looking forward to carrying all these bags back to the car.  

He drops the last bag in the trunk, and leans against the car for a minute to catch his breath.  Lup  looks utterly unfazed.  

“ Have you – have you got alien super strength or something?”  He pants.  

“ Nah, I just made you carry most of it.”  

“Yeah,”  he straightens up, putting a little playful venom in his tone. “ I noticed.”  

“Hey!”  She protests, but her smile gives her away. “ I’m wounded.”  

He pants for a moment longer – mostly for dramatic effect – and then smiles. “ Ready for some clothes shopping?”  

“Fuck yes.”  Lup  looks more excited than he’s seen her the whole time they’ve been together. “ I’m so ready to stop wearing your old pyjamas every night.”  

He laughs. “ I thought you made ‘ em  look good.”  He only means to remind her of her own words from that morning, but she looks so flattered he’s not  gonna  enlighten her.  

“ Aw, thanks. I did, didn’t I.”  

They head back into town again, towards the clothes shop. It’s  pretty decently  sized, spread across two floors, so Barry’s hopeful  Lup’ll  find something she likes. Normally he just grabs a pair of jeans and a couple of t-shirts, but  Lup’s  a bit more dramatic than he is.  

“ Shit, Barry, look at this!”  She bursts out of the changing room, twirling to show him the sundress she’s wearing. She’s got a pair of sunglasses pushed up on her head. “ Cute, right?”  

He gives her a thumbs up, smiling, as he pulls a plain white shirt off the rack and tosses it in the basket. She scowls.  

“ No way am I letting you leave here with just another white t-shirt, Barry. Where’s your sense of adventure?”  She walks up to the rack, quickly scanning through the things. “ What about this?”  She holds one up a shirt with a pineapple in a thong emblazoned on the front, the word “SLUT” underneath in huge letters. He flushes, even though he’s sure she doesn’t understand what the word means.  

“ Uh, I’m not sure that’s safe for, ah, polite company,”  he stammers. She tosses it back on the rack.  

“ Alright, Barold, you win this round. I will find you something with a bit of colour, though, eventually.”  

“I, uh, I like your dress, though!”  He tries to change the subject. “ You  gonna  get that one?”  

She grumbles, but it’s clearly in good humour. “ Yeah, I think so. This and those crop tops and leggings. And some  jorts , then we’ll match.”  

“ I don’t - I have pants other than jeans!”  He protests.  

She raises an eyebrow silently.  

“ I - pyjamas count!”  

She laughs and shakes her head.  

B arry’s smiling and grabbing the basket from the floor, when he notices the clock on the wall says one o’clock. “ Oh, shit, get changed, we’re  gonna  be late.”  

She heads back into the changing room, he buys the clothes she'd wanted, and they’re at the café by only ten past , which doesn’t stop Barry feeling bad about being late. He scans the room,  Lup  at his side trying to decipher the menu displayed above the counter.  

“Ah, c’mon,” he tugs at  Lup’s  sleeve as he spots a familiar face, sat in a corner booth. He sits down on the bench and scoots round to let  Lup  sit too, and he says, “Angus, meet  Lup .  Lup , this is Angus.”  

“Hello ma’am!” Angus says.  

Chapter Text

“Hello,” Lup says, a little bit too slowly. 

“It’s okay, you don’t have to pretend. I, uh, told him you were an immigrant.”  

Lup nods. “Okay, uh, who is this kid? He’s - wait, he’s not your son?”  

Barry chokes as a laugh surprises him. “No, god. No. He looks nothing like me, Lup, he’s black. He’s a detective.”  

“Barry, he’s - a kid.”  

“Okay, yeah, but he’s also fuckin’ good at his job. Trust me.”  

“Doesn’t earth have like... child labour laws? You’re just cool to let a literal baby solve crime?”  

“He’s ten.” Barry says, and turns back to Angus. “Sorry, Ango.” 

“That’s okay sir! I’m just reading my book,” Angus says, lifting his Caleb Cleveland novel above the table. “Does Miss Lup speak any Common?” 

“Uh, a little. I can translate.” 

“Where are you from, Miss?” 

“He asks where you’re from. Uh, I can just lie, I wasn’t planning on saying you’re, uh – I’m not gonna say 'space.'”  

“Yeah, that makes sense.”  

“ Uh, Honduras.” Barry picked a Central American country based on Lup’s dark skin tone, and on the fact that he doesn’t know any Hondurans who can ask Lup any difficult questions. He’s pretty sure they don’t speak elvish in Honduras, but they’ll just say she lived with an elvish community or something. 

“Hm,” Angus writes something in his notebook – quite a long something. 

“Uh, what, uh what’re you writing there, Ango?” 

“Oh, just a note to read up on Honduras! I didn’t know they spoke elvish there!” 

Barry fights to keep his face neutral. 

“Ok, hear me out,  Lup ,” he says. “ I know I’m - I’m springing this on you, but – I was thinking about how I could help you. And, like, I think this is our best shot at finding Taako .”  

Lup looks shocked, and he scurries to explain himself. 

“I - I checked, he’s done missing persons cases before, and he – Ango owes me anyway, because I helped him in a case a while back – uh, he needed some chemicals analysed and I -”  She places a hand on his to cut him off. He can feel himself flushing a little as her fingers wrap into his. 

“Barry, if – if you think he can find Taako , I – it's worth it. Anything is.”  

“Okay, Angus. Uh, basically, uh,  Lup  – she got into town, and her brother – he's missing. They’re both new here.” He pauses. “I never asked what Taako  looks like. Angus will probably need a description.”  

“We’re identical twins,”  Lup  says. "Except his fashion sense is way worse.”  

“They’re identical,” Barry says, smiling a little. 

“Am I right to assume you can’t go to the police?” Angus asks. “This kind of thing is hard without the right resources.” 

“No, we can’t.” 

Angus nods, thankfully not pressing the issue. “Where was he last seen? Do you have any friends he might go to? Where’s he likely to go?” 

Barry quickly runs some things by Lup before turning back to Angus. “Uh, he was last seen about five miles north of town. They’re both new around here, so – we don’t know where he’d go.” 

“Five miles...” Angus mutters, scribbling in his book. “When was this?” 

“Uh, May seventeenth.” 

“Oh, wow, did they see the rocket?” Angus says, enthusiastic. “That’s the day and place the military weapon crashed!” 

Barry scours Angus’ face for any signs the kid’s realised anything, but his features are a mask of innocence. “No, I don’t - I don’t think they saw,” he says, trying to keep his tone steady. 

Lup’s been fidgety this whole time. “Can he – does he think he can find Taako?”  

“Ma’am,”  Angus says, surprising them both with his perfect elvish, accent and all. “I promise I’ll find your brother. And your secret is safe with me. I know all about aliens! There were some in the newest Caleb Cleveland book!”  

Adults always underestimate Angus, and he sure knows how to exploit it. He grins a little as he unfurls his map. He’d thought Mr. Barry would have known better, but obviously not. 

His grin fades a little as he examines the map. The crash site was here – he sticks a pin into the map – and Miss Lup had gone this way – he puts another pin on Barry’s house, connecting the two with a red, sparkly twine to illustrate the path she’d taken. 

He opens the notebook and reads over the notes he’d taken in his meeting with Miss Lup and Mr. Barry. Miss Lup’s instinct had been to avoid the town, Angus notes, even though she’d been wounded. Her brother would probably do the same, at first, but it had been weeks – he’d certainly need food and shelter. Maybe he’d head into town to get it? But Miss Lup had said that he wouldn’t trust people... 

Angus already knows that Mr. Taako hadn’t gone east around the town – that's the way Miss Lup went. So, assuming Angus’ hypothesis holds true, and that he’d circle the town, he must have gone west. He draws a little pencil arrow westward around the town. Following that logic, he’d eventually come to the road leading into town, and Angus would put money on Mr. Taako following that road, if he were old enough to gamble. 

Angus would readily admit that this is all guesswork. He’s assuming a lot – Mr. Taako might’ve gone east and not seen Miss Lup in the dark, or he might’ve headed away from town. But Angus’ hunches have always served him well, and the best detective work is always based on a little inference– Caleb Cleveland had taught him that. So, he gathers up his notebook, as well as a photo of Miss Lup he’d snapped – with her permission, of course – and puts on his little deerstalker hat, grabbing his magnifying glass. 

Time to find an alien. 

As it turns out, it’s not quite as exciting as Angus had hoped. He’s following the main road into town that he suspects Mr. Taako took, two weeks ago, and hoping something catches his eye that would give him a clue as to where the elf went. Every time he passes a restaurant or a café, he heads inside to show the picture of Lup and ask if they’ve seen an elf that looks like this. 

The answer is always the same. No. 

At first, he hadn’t let it put him off. He suspects that someone who didn’t want to get spotted would probably be stealing food, most likely from bins, late at night. It’s not surprising no one’s seen him. Angus always makes sure to reconnoitre the back alleys and parking lots of the places he asks in, and he’s still hopeful that eventually he’ll spot something. Eventually, though, the continued failure starts to get him down. 

Angus grabs a milkshake from the last café on his route. He’s visited over a dozen cafes today - maybe Mr. Taako hadn’t headed into town? Maybe he’d stayed around the edges? 

He pulls a smaller, pocket-sized version of the town map he’d used earlier out of his pocket, and scans the edge of town as he slurps down his drink. If he’d ignored the main road, he would’ve eventually gone around  this  way – he traces the route on the map with his finger. That would suggest he’d pass these houses here, and this park, and the school, and – Angus stabs a finger on the map – here, there’s a small café. Perfect. 

The sign above the door proclaims this café to be the Davy Lamp. Angus has never been here before, but that’s not really surprising, because he lives on the opposite side of town, and the place is really out of the way. It looks nice, though, with a nice atmosphere and décor. It’s quiet, with only one table occupied – Angus suspects he’s only just missed the lunchtime rush – and so, as he enters, a drow woman smiles at him broadly. 

“Hey, kid, welcome to the Davy Lamp. What can I getcha?” 

“Hi!” He says, enthusiastically, practically bouncing from foot to foot. He’s good at playing the role of the excitable ten-year-old, and it always makes adults lower their guard. “I’m Angus McDonald! What’s your name?” 

She smiles – as adults always do, when confronted with the full force of Angus’ performance modifier – and says, “I’m Ren. You gonna order, kid?” with a laugh in her voice. 

“Uh,” Angus says. Normally he’d get a milkshake, but he’d just had one at that other café, and he doesn’t want to upset his stomach. “Can I see a menu?” 

“Sure, you wanna take a seat at the bar?” 

Angus makes a show of struggling to clamber up onto the barstool – adults love that shit – and takes the menu from her hands. “Thank you, ma’am!” He scans it, scrunching up his face in concentration. 

Okay, maybe he’s laying it on a little thick, but he needs information from this lady. 

“Can I have a coke? Please?” He says. 

“Sure, kid,” she says, and reaches down into the fridge below the bar. She straightens up and places a can on the table. He takes a slurp, subtly watching her watch him. 

“Hey, you, uh – where are your parents?” 

“Oh, I’m here alone right now! I’m meant to be meeting my uncle,” Angus says. “But I was late, so he might have left already.” He tries to look a little lost and sad and scared. “Have you seen him?” 

“Uh, what does he look like? It was busy here earlier, but I – I can try.” Ren looks worried, as adults generally are when they find out that Angus is alone. 

“He’s, uh, quite tall, blonde, an elf.” 

“An elf?” Ren asks, glancing at Angus’ lack of pointy ears. “Your uncle is an elf?” 

“I’m adopted, ma’am,” Angus says. “I have a picture of him! Hold on!” He rifles through his little backpack. “Here.” He passes over the picture of Lup. 

“Oh, yeah, I have seen this dude. Not today, though,” Ren says, with an odd look on her face. “He’s your uncle? He – uh, he doesn’t normally come in to eat.” 

“Is he stealing food, ma’am?” Angus says, in his detective voice suddenly. Ren blinks and steps back in surprise at the sudden change in his demeanour. 

“Uh, yeah, I mean – I saw him first a couple weeks ago, taking food from our dumpsters,” she says. “Hold up – wait a minute, he’s not your uncle, right? What is this?” 

“I’m a detective, ma’am,” he says. “I’m sorry for lying to you but I’m on a case!” 

“A - what? You’re like, ten years old.” 

“I was officially hired, Miss Ren. I’m being paid and everything.” 

“What, to find – this homeless dude?” 

“Yes, you said he was taking food from your dumpsters? Is that every night?” 

“Uh, no, I – it was, and then I felt bad for him. You know, we’re chucking stuff away every night, so – I figured he might as well eat it. I – he'll probably be here this evening, if you want to come back? At, like, ten? Is that – that's probably past your bedtime, right?” 

“Ma’am, I’m ten.” Angus says, staring her down. “My bedtime is eight o’clock. But I’ll be here.” 

“Okay, but, I mean, he doesn’t say much. I’ve been feeding him for weeks and he’s not said a word to me.” 

“That’s fine, ma’am. I know ways to get people to talk.” 

As Angus walks back out, Ren stares at him, but so does her only customer – a tall, dark-skinned human man in a suit. He watches Angus leave, and as the door swings shut behind him, he dials a number on his phone. “Madam Director?” He says. “It’s Kravitz. There’s been a development.” 

Chapter Text

Kravitz hasn’t had a great couple of days. He’d been forced to inform the Director that he’d had no luck finding the fugitive, which had spurred her to make the decision to expand the search radius.  

He doesn’t blame her, but he is frustrated. His gut tells him their fugitive is somewhere local, still, and now he’s the only operative left in Faerun, all the others being pulled out to search nearby Neverwinter and Goldcliff. He’s not even getting updates from the Director about the search for wherever the alien ship came from. It’s driving him insane, not having any idea what’s happening.  

The only blessing is that he’s not under any orders, currently, so he’s able to operate with some level of autonomy. He’s following a hunch – that Barry Hallwinter knows something he’s not letting on.  

He spends his days watching the guy’s house, and his nights eating Ben & Jerry’s and watching reruns of CSI: Miami in his motel room. It’s not the high point of Kravitz’s career, and neither is it very interesting, especially when Kravitz is used to deployment in tropical countries and the thrill of reclaiming dangerous alien artefacts.  

He’s sat in his car, wearing a false moustache, watching Barry and his girlfriend walk down Main Street. Kravitz hadn’t expected them to be quite so bold, considering that he’d assumed she was a junior researcher – doesn't their workplace have rules against dating your superior? – but maybe their relationship was more official than he’d considered.  

He quickly brings up a newspaper to cover his face when they walk past, dropping it again to watch them in the mirror. Gods, he’s bored.  

He watches them walk into a café, and folds the newspaper up. He’d better go check what they’re up to. Worst case scenario, he has to watch them making lovey eyes at each other some more, but he can at least get a coffee.  

He almost laughs when he  realises  they’re meeting a child. What had he been expecting, that there’d be a little green man in an overcoat and hat? He orders a coffee and mentally prepares himself for another night at his shitty motel with nothing but Phish Food for company.  

But, then, he sees the kid is writing. What’s he writing? And Barry’s telling the kid something. Is he – is the kid a messenger, or something?  

Is Barry  Hallwinter  a master criminal with a network of underage informants?  

Kravitz looks him up and down and sighs. He’s definitely been watching too much ridiculous TV. The dude doesn’t wear anything except faded jeans and t-shirts with old band logos on, what crime could he possibly be committing? Except against fashion, of course.  

But, it’s not as if he has anything better to do, and Kravitz knows that Barry is just  gonna  go home with his girlfriend and watch TV. Like he does, every night. Might as well follow this actual, literal child around.  

Imagine his surprise when he realises the kid has actually found something – a homeless dude, eating at a café at the edge of town every night since the crash. Seems like his fugitive is in disguise, Kravitz thinks. Now all that’s left is to set an ambush.  

It’s hot. Why’s it so hot?  

Taako  groans and reaches down to throw the covers off. His hand doesn’t find his comfortable bedsheets.  

He forces his eyes open, and he’s suddenly fully awake. Oh, shit.  

The ship is on fire. The cockpit’s windows have shattered, and there’s coolant from a ruptured pipe dripping on his face, stinging as it drips into his eyes. He’s buckled into his chair and he yanks at the seatbelt to no avail. The flame roars, consuming the banks of consoles that form the ship’s computers.  

“ Lup !” He shouts. “ Lup ! Help me!”  

Then he turns, and he sees her. She’s buckled in, too, but she’s not fighting to escape. Her head hangs, her chin on her chest. He reaches out to shake her awake but her head lolls backwards, her eyes open but unseeing, bloody wounds covering her face and arms and chest. The flames lick closer and consume her as Taako watches, screaming until his throat is raw -  

And then his eyes snap open as the first rays of sunlight cross the horizon. He’s dripping with sweat, his mouth dry, and he heaves himself upright in time to vomit.  

Another fucking nightmare.  

He stands and feels sorry for himself for another minute, panting and spitting the last of the vile taste from his mouth.  

Times like this, a guy really misses toothbrushes.  

He looks around. He's been sleeping under an overpass just outside town, using a discarded tarpaulin as a quilt-cum-tent. It’s not the most comfortable living, but he can’t bring himself to leave this shitty town.  

Lup’s  somewhere nearby.  

He’d be able to tell if she were dead, he knows it. She – she can’t be dead. She has to be living in the town. She's smarter than he is, and he’s been able to avoid this planet’s cops no sweat.  Taako  can’t leave until he finds her.  

He staggers to the edge of the overpass and glares down at the town. There’s only, like, a thousand people living there, tops. And she’s still nowhere to be found.  

Taako  doesn’t entirely blame himself for that. Firstly, the people here don’t speak elvish. He couldn’t very well roll up and ask if anyone had seen his twin. Secondly, and more pressingly, if – if the military here had captured Lup, they know what he looks like. He has to keep a low profile. Thirdly, he’s not really sure what he’s looking for. If Lup is in town somewhere, she’s hiding. He’s just stumbling around like an idiot, getting excited every time he sees his reflection.  

He’s just thankful for that woman who lets him eat in her restaurant. He was getting sick practically every night from the old food he was stealing from dumpsters until he met her. Of course, her food isn’t as good as what he could make, but beggars can’t be choosers, and at least it’s fresh.  

Taako  starts on the long walk into town. He needs to search more. He has to find her.  

He’s already looked across most of the east side of town, searching back alleys and park benches. The west side of town is more densely populated, and  Taako  had assumed that  Lup  would avoid that, but maybe not. Maybe she’s found an abandoned house or something to live in. Maybe she’s charmed some rich asshole and moved into his mansion. Maybe she’s in a cell in some military facility somewhere, and  Taako’s   gonna  have to stage a  one-man  prison break.  

He spends another day fruitlessly searching dumpsters and parking lots before slumping down on a park bench. What had he been expecting? It’s been two weeks. What if she’s just gone?  

He wordlessly heaves himself back up and trudges back to the far side of town. If he’s too late, the lady will close up the restaurant and he’ll have to go hungry for the evening. He can always get back to searching later.  

He’s never going to give up. He’ll raze this world if he has to,  to  find her.  

Chapter Text

Lup’s quiet on the car ride back home, and Barry guesses that’s to be expected. He had kind of sprung the Taako thing on her, and she was probably still a little doubtful of Angus’ abilities. 

“You okay?”  He says, quietly. 

“Yeah,”  she replies. “I just – I don’t know if I should let myself be hopeful. It’s - it’s been so long. Taako’s probably in a facility somewhere."  

Barry sighs as he pulls into his driveway. “If anyone can find him, Angus can. He’s a smart kid.”  

“I believe you.”  She chuckles. “You should’ve seen your face when he spoke in elvish.”  

“I didn’t - how was I meant to know!”  Barry protests, but he laughs too. “ I should’ve expected it. It’s safe to assume Angus can read minds, honestly.”   

He unlocks the front door, stepping back to let Sildar out. The cat hisses at Lup before slinking away, and she rolls her eyes. 

“He really doesn’t like me, huh?”  

“I wonder if he can smell that you’re not from earth,”  Barry muses. “He’s not like this with any of the earth elves I know.”  

“Your theory is that I smell bad?”  

“Well, I mean,”  Barry trips over his words a bit, “Yes, basically.”  He concedes, suppressing the urge to tell her that he thinks she smells good, actually. 

She laughs, in that way of hers that turns Barry’s knees to jelly. “Thanks, Bear.”  He’s not normally one for nicknames, but the way she says it somehow sounds so affectionate and - 

Barry cuts that train of thought off before it leaves the station. She’s not interested in him, he tells himself. As soon as she finds her brother, she’ll be out of here. He’s got to stop himself getting too head over heels or he knows he’ll be devastated. 

“At least I got some perfume at that store,”  she says. “ Maybe then Sildar will love me.”  

“Oh!”  He says, patting down his pockets. “That reminds me, uh – you wanted your nails done, soooo...”  He pulls out a couple of bottles of nail polish – a deep purple and a pale blue first, and then finally, one he’d seen and thought would be perfect for her, a flame red. “I didn’t know what colour you’d like, so I just got a couple. Uh, you don’t have to use them, obviously, I can take you to a proper nail salon -”  

She shushes him by putting a finger to his lips. He immediately feels a blush start to rise to his cheeks. “Thank you, Barry, that’s very kind.”  She takes the red. “Wanna help me with this? It’s always easier when someone else does it.”  

“Oh, of course, okay.”  

She sits down on the floor, resting her hand on his coffee table. He sits opposite and pulls the tiny brush out. “It’s, uh – I don’t do this, normally, so you’ll have to forgive some splashes.”  

They sit in silence for a minute as Barry paints. He’s never really noticed what a fidget she is; she barely sits still for more than a couple of seconds before she has to shift her legs or her shoulders or her fingers. It leads to him getting polish more or less everywhere, but she looks so apologetic every time that he can’t be mad. 

He finishes one hand, and stands back to examine his handiwork. Pretty much the entire tip of every finger is red. 

She grins. “Is that how they do nail polish on earth, babe?”  

“I did warn you I wasn’t much good at this,” he smiles bashfully. 

She proffers the other hand. “Practice makes perfect.”  

“Red again?”  

“Yeah, go for it. It’s my colour.”  

He paints her other hand, too, and it’s equally bad. “At least I know who to come to for my Halloween costume,”  she says. He grins. It does look like her hands are covered in blood. 

He finishes up her pinkie and she pulls the hand away to blow on the nails. He catches a glimpse of the palm of her hand, too, and there’s somehow red polish even there. 

“I’ll grab some remover,”  he says, standing up and stretching his back out. “There’s some in the bags in the hall.” She nods, still blowing on her varnish, and so Barry stands up and heads back out to where he dumped the bags of shopping. He’s rooting around when the doorbell rings. 

He looks up, confused. He’s not expecting anyone, and it’s not like he gets a lot of guests. He stands up and opens the door, to find two elves, one male and one female. They both stare at him. 

“Hello,” the female elf says, grinning widely. It’s enough to make Barry a little uncomfortable. “We are from the water board.” She indicates their van, a large blue thing with the words “Faerun Water” painted on the side.  

Barry knits his brow. “Oh, uh, okay, what’s up?” He says. Getting a visit from two plumbers at once can’t be good. He’s envisioning flooding, or them needing to dig up his garden for maintenance on a pipe. Neither of them answers the question, though, their eyes slightly glazed over as he speaks.  

They’re both shockingly stunning – if not for Lup, Barry would say these plumbers were the most gorgeous people he’d ever seen. There’s a beat of silence before they answer. “Can we come in?” The male elf says, matching the female’s grin. 

“Uh, okay?” Barry holds the door open for them, stepping back to allow them in, but suddenly Sildar appears from out of nowhere. He sprints across the gravel and launches himself at the male elf, hissing and yowling and spitting, and he scratches at the elf’s exposed ankles. 

“Shit, Sildar!” Barry shouts, trying to grab the cat, but Sildar keeps jumping from his grasp and launching himself at the elves again, both of whom have jumped back a significant distance. He finally gets a good grasp on the cat, who keeps hissing even from Barry’s arms. “I’m so sorry, I’ve never seen him do this... before...” 

He looks at the two elves, something dawning on him suddenly. 

The male elf turns to the female and they speak in rapid-fire elvish, too fast for Barry to catch more than a couple of words. He hadn’t realised how slowly Lup talked for him to understand until now. The female elf looks at him with a poisonous glance, and snarls, exposing her sharp, pointed fangs.

Barry gulps. “Uh,” he says, eloquently. 

And then Lup pushes him aside. Barry drops Sildar and the cat disappears down the drive, but Barry’s watching Lup – she shouts a wordless war cry as her hands ignite – holy shit, Barry thinks – and she hurls fireballs at the two elves on the doorstep, and they scream, patting at the fire that catches on their clothes and Lup hurls herself at them, punching the male elf solidly in the face with a still flaming fist. He goes down like a sack of bricks and she rounds on the female elf, kicking her in the knee. The female elf stumbles, dropping to one knee, and Lup grabs her by the hair and yanks, her hand still smouldering. The elf yells, and Lup knees her in the face and she falls too. 

“Barry, we have to leave. Right fucking now,” Lup says. Barry’s mouth hangs open, staring at her and the two unconscious elves. “Barry!”  She shouts. 

“Shit, I – okay,”  he says, and pulls his car keys out of his pocket. “Where - where are we going?”  

“Fucking anywhere, Barry, just drive. There’s no way there’s only two of them, and I can’t fight them off.”  She climbs into the passenger seat, nervously scanning the horizon. 

He puts his foot down, and the tyres squeal for a second before the car pulls away. 

Chapter Text

Angus is practically vibrating with excitement. He’d found Mr. Taako within hours of being hired! Miss Lup and Mr. Barry were going to be so excited! He grins to himself. Solving a two-week-old missing persons case in – he checks his watch – five hours can only be good for his resume. 

He looks around the bus he’s taking to Mr. Barry’s. There’s a man – he's got a newborn baby at home, Angus thinks, looking at his tired eyes and plastic shopping bag, full of groceries but originally from a baby care shop – and two women – in a new relationship, he deduces, from the giggles and subtle hand-holding. 

The bus pulls into his stop. “Thank you, sir!” Angus says, and the bus driver smiles at him. The man with the bag follows Angus off the bus, but heads in the opposite direction. The women stay put, and Angus’ deduction is proven correct as they lean in for a kiss after they think no one is watching. He grins to himself. It’s nice to be right. 

He hums a tune – the new animated Caleb Cleveland: Kid Cop show’s theme – as he walks down the road towards Barry’s house. It’s nearly summer in Faerun, and he’s enjoying the sunlight. Maybe he’ll buy an ice cream after Mr. Barry pays him! 

He turns into Barry’s driveway, the gravel crunching underfoot. Huh. His car isn’t in the driveway. Maybe he hasn’t got back from being in town yet? Even Angus hadn’t expected to solve the case this quickly, and Mr. Barry and Miss Lup might be going for dinner together or something. Angus smiles a little. He wouldn’t have to be the world’s greatest detective (which he is) to tell that they’re crushing on each other. 

He steps up to the front door and rings the bell, not really expecting a reply. He’s almost ready to get the bus back and come back another day when he notices the blood on the floor. 

He immediately squats down, inspecting the spill. It’s starting to dry in the sun’s heat, and so Angus estimates that it’s maybe an hour old. He looks up, scanning the treeline surrounding Mr. Barry’s property for any sign of whoever’s done this, but he suspects they’re long gone. 

He really hopes this isn’t Mr. Barry’s blood. 

He straightens back up, and tries the door handle. It’s unlocked. 

There are shopping bags all over the floor of the hall, not yet unloaded. Nothing else seems out of place. Angus walks from the hall into the living room, where Barry’s coffee table has a knocked-over bottle of nail polish dripping slowly onto the carpet. Angus places the bottle back upright - the carpet’s probably already ruined, but he’d feel bad leaving it. It’s still about a quarter full, which further suggests that whatever happened here didn’t happen long ago. Angus stands back up again, pulling his phone from his pocket and dialling. 

Barry’s phone rings from the kitchen. 

“Shit,” Angus says, because he can cuss all he wants when there’s no adults around. 

What does Angus do now? He’s found Mr. Taako, but Mr. Barry and Miss Lup have disappeared. He looks down at his notebook. They left in a hurry, not even stopping to grab Barry’s phone. One of them is possibly wounded. Were they attacked? Who’d want to attack Mr. Barry? 

Unless they weren’t after Barry. 

Angus scribbles an extra note in the margin of his book. “Someone after Miss Lup?” He writes. 

“Whatcha writing there, kid?” Ren says as she cleans a shot glass. 

“Just some case notes, miss!” Angus replies, taking a slurp of his orange juice. “Thank you for letting me wait here!” 

“Yeah, it’s okay. I’m not really sure I should, uh, let you leave on your own, since you’re like, ten -” 

“My grandpa lets me do what I want, miss,” Angus replies. It’s not quite a lie, he just hadn’t incorporated the past tense – his grandfather had died last year, but even when he was alive, he hadn’t paid much attention to his grandson. Angus doesn’t advertise that, though, because most adults seem to think he needs to be put into the system, or whatever. “And it’s not even that much after my bedtime.” 

The only thing Angus can think to do is meet Mr. Taako. If someone was after Miss Lup, he’d surely know. Anyway, if he leaves now to hunt for Barry and Lup alone, there’s always the risk Taako will leave before he finds them, and then he’ll have to search for him all over again. 

So Angus is waiting in the Davy Lamp for Taako to arrive. There’s no one else here, just him and Ren, and it’s nearly ten – the time Ren says Taako usually arrives. 

He’s worried. What if Taako doesn’t trust him? What if he doesn’t come at all? What if whoever attacked Miss Lup and Mr. Barry comes for him?  That last thought only makes Angus all the more resolute. If someone had hurt Miss Lup, it stands to reason Mr. Taako would be next. Angus needs to warn him. 

Then the door opens, and Angus tries not to whip round to stare. The man coming through is undoubtedly Taako – he’s the spitting image of Lup. He even walks in the same way. 

He walks up to the counter, smiling at Ren once. She smiles back, a little tenderly, sliding a plate of spaghetti over the counter to him. 

“Hello, sir,”  Angus says, trying to keep his voice calming. Taako whips round anyway, staring at him. 

“The fuck?”  Taako  says. “The only person on this whole damn planet who speaks elvish is a baby?”  

Angus scowls. “I’m not a baby. I’m ten.”  

“When I was  ten, I was a newborn,”  Taako says, and Angus has to stop himself giggling. This is case-related, he tells himself. 

“That sounds like your personal problem, sir.”  Angus says, entirely deadpan. 

Taako stares down at him, and Angus starts to think he’s pissed him off. Then Taako laughs heartily, turning back to his spaghetti. Angus breathes a sigh of relief. “What is it, kid?”  

“Sir, I – are you Taako?”  

Taako spins back around, his eyes wide and scared. “Who the fuck wants to know?”  

“I - Miss Lup asked me to find you -”  

Taako gasps, his face a mask of glee, and he cackles. “I knew she wasn’t dead! Take me to her, little man, right now.”  

Angus’ face must betray his dismay, because Taako’s expression turns worried. “What - where is she? Is she okay? She’s - she’s fine, right?”  

“I - I don’t know.”  Angus says. “I - I’m sorry, sir, I went to see her earlier today and she wasn’t there – I don’t know what happened to her.”  

“Fuck,”  Taako  looks like he might cry for a split second before he rearranges his face to be neutral. “Well, kid, as far as I can see my situation hasn’t changed. I still have to find her.”  

There’s a silence as Taako shoves a whole meatball into his mouth. 

“Wait, but, sir, you need me. I found you in, like, five hours. I’m a detective! I can help -”  

“Cha’boy  doesn’t  need  anyone,”  Taako  says, sounding like he’s maybe trying to convince himself.  He hums in thought.“ But you did find me. And I’ve been hiding from the cops on this planet, like, super easy.”  He hums. “ Okay, kid, where would we start? If I was  gonna  hire you, like, hypothetically.”  

Angus practically glows with excitement. “Well, sir, I’d start by looking for Mr. Barry’s car -”  

And the door opens behind them, and a tall black man with dreads and a dark suit walks in. 

“Hey, we’re closed!” Ren calls. Angus had forgotten she’d been sat there, watching him and Taako talking with a bemused look on her face. “Eight a.m. to nine p.m., my guy.” 

Wordlessly, the man pulls a wallet out and flashes it at her. Angus blanches. This guy is FBI. 

Taako takes one look and turns back to his spaghetti, lazily shovelling it into his mouth. 

“Sir!”  Angus says. “This guy – he's FBI! A cop!” Taako doesn’t respond. “Sir!”  

“Yeah, little man, I worked out what the shield meant on my own, actually,”  Taako says. 

“You speak Elvish?” The man says, watching Taako, his head cocked curiously. He turns to Angus. “Can you tell him I just want to ask him some questions -” 

Taako exaggeratedly rolls his eyes at Angus and takes another bite of spaghetti. “Can you tell her -”  he indicates Ren - “that this is fucking delicious, and I’m really thankful she let me eat here?”  

Angus looks nervously at the agent, and then repeats Taako’s statement to Ren in common. She smiles. “Aw, you’re welcome, hun.” 

“And that I’m really sorry that I’ve got to do this?”  

“Do wha -”  Angus starts to ask. 

The lights flicker overhead as Taako stands up, and he raises an arm just as the room plunges into darkness. The only light now comes from the open doorway, backlighting the agent, who’s still blocking the exit. 

A gaping rift opens above him, pitch black but studded with tiny pinpoints of light, as if it were a portal into the depths of space. There’s only a second for him and Angus and Ren to gape at it before the portal is suddenly full of writhing tentacles that reach down from the ceiling and grab the guy. 

He yells, writhing, kicking and punching at the tentacles, but they wrap around his torso and pull him slowly upwards, suspending his flailing body above the doorway. 

“Let’s go, pumpkin,”  Taako  says, placing a hand on the back of Angus’ head and shepherding towards the door. “Cha’boy  can’t keep this up forever.”  

As Taako and Angus duck under the mass of writhing tentacles to walk through the doorway, Taako blows the dude a kiss, and then the door slams shut behind them. 

Chapter Text

Pro:  

The kid says he can find  Lup .  Taako  believes him.  

Con:  

He can’t eat at Ren’s any more.  Taako’s  not looking forward to eating at the dumpster buffet again.  

Pro:  

Taako  took a handful of mints off Ren’s counter, and so he’s at least got some hard candy.  

Con:  

That guy knows what he looks like, now, and Ren probably has security footage. His face is  gonna  be plastered on wanted posters across the country.  

Overall, it seems like the glass is maybe more half-empty than half-full.  

“ So, his car wasn’t there, which means that they probably escaped. We can start by looking for his car.”  The kid beams up at him.  

Taako  nods, not really having listened to a word he’s been saying. “ Sounds good, kid.”  He looks over his shoulder in what he hopes is a casual move, scanning his surroundings. “ What’s your name?”   

They’re at a bus stop – not the one closest to Ren’s,  Taako  was smarter than that, he knows the cops are  gonna  be looking for him, but they need to get out of town, right now.  

“ Angus McDonald, sir!”  

“You got a hat or anything, Angus McDonald? It’s pretty clear you’re not my kid,”  Taako  says, indicating his own ears. “ I don’t want anyone thinking I’m kidnapping you.”  He pauses, wincing. “ I guess I am, huh?”  

Angus pulls a baseball cap from his backpack and adjusts it to cover the tops of his ears.  Taako  examines him, and it’s not immediately obvious that the kid is human. “ Not so much we can do about the skin colour difference, but we’ll just have to hope no one notices.”  He winces. “ This is such a bad plan.”  

Angus frowns. “ It might  technically  be kidnapping, sir, but I’m coming with you of my own free will.”  

“Sure, pumpkin,”  Taako  says. “ What’s our cover story if anyone asks who I am to you? Uncle?”  

“Distant cousin from abroad,”  Angus nods as the bus pulls up. “ You don’t speak common.”  He pauses. “ Try not to tentacle anyone if it’s not absolutely necessary, please, sir.”  

Taako  pulls the cap down a little further over his eyes, and Angus tries to look down at his feet and not at the bus driver.  

“Uh, two tickets to Neverwinter Depot, please, sir,” he says, and puts his coins on the counter. The driver grunts – thankfully it’s not a driver Angus recognises – and passes over the tickets.  Taako  takes them and steers Angus down the corridor of the bus, right to the back. As Angus walks, he examines the faces of the people on the bus – a human teenager as well as a  dwarvish  lady, probably aged about 300, neither of whom seem like secret agents to Angus. There’s a youngish man on the phone and a woman with a baby that Angus is somewhat suspicious of, but as he watches the man gets up and steps off the bus. He sits in his chair next to  Taako  and tries his best to relax, but he keeps a nervous eye on the woman the whole journey.  

Taako  is resistant to letting Angus rent them a pair of motel rooms, even when Angus explains that his inheritance is more than enough. He finally agrees, after Angus suggests he reimburses him after they find  Lup , but he still looks a little uncomfortable.  

“ Okay, sir,”  Angus says, pointing at his pocket map. “ We’re here, and this is  Faerun . If I were Mr. Barry, I’d have come here, because it’s a bigger town and it’s easier to hide, which is unfortunate for us.”  

“So, like, where are they? You’re the detective,”  Taako  says, lying flat on his back on the larger of the two beds in their room.  

“ Well, you know Miss  Lup . I hoped you’d be able to give me some ideas.”  

Taako  sits upright and bites his lip, crinkling up his nose in thought. “ I don’t think she’d want to go far from  Faerun . Especially not if she thinks that’s where I am. So maybe on this side of town?”  He puts a finger on the map.  

“ Okay,”  Angus says. He'd already reached that conclusion, and he’d been hoping for something a bit more concrete, but he’s sure he can make it work. “ Mr. Barry won’t use credit cards if he knows he’s being hunted, so he’ll have no choice but to use cash. That means he’s limited on the hotels he can stay in. They’ll have to be cheap, too. We can use process of elimination. We can check hotel parking lots for his car – oh!”  He reaches into his bag. “ I’ve got a photo of miss  Lup ! We can go from hotel to hotel and show them this and ask if they’ve seen her!”  

Taako  sniffs. “ Process of elimination sounds boring. You sure you can’t tell where he is by his favourite colour, or whatever? You’re meant to be this world’s greatest detective or whatever.”  

“Sure, I could, but I don’t know what his favourite colour is, so we’ll have to do this the old-fashioned way,”  Angus says, deadpan.  Taako  laughs.  

It took Kravitz  hours  to get the slime from those tentacles off him.  

He's fuming. Not only is he going to have to inform the Director that the fugitive was under his nose the whole time, but he’s going to have to tell her that he lost him in possibly the most humiliating way imaginable.  

The only positive is that now, he knows for sure that Barry  Hallwinter  has something to do with the fucking fugitive – he'd been talking to the kid right before the kid met the fugitive. He’s  gonna  march up there and  demand  that he tells him everything he knows.  

Unfortunately for Kravitz, that doesn’t go as planned either.  

The Director is silent as he explains the situation, waiting for him to finish before she says anything.  

“Kravitz, let me get this straight,” she says, in a perfectly neutral tone of voice that, even without seeing her face over the phone, Kravitz knows means he’s in deep shit. “The fugitive was in town the whole time. A child located him, where you couldn’t. He opened a  portal to hell  and you got attacked by tentacles and the fugitive and the child  left  and you can’t find them?”  

“ That roughly sums it up, ma’am.”  

She’s silent for a minute. “I’d laugh, Kravitz, if this wasn’t so objectively horrifying. There is a dangerous alien at large, an alien who can  do magic,  and you have failed to apprehend him.”  

“Yes, ma’am.”  

“And, now, you’re telling me that your only lead has disappeared without trace?”  

Kravitz winces, looking over at where the lab techs are closing off and examining Barry’s house. “Not... quite without trace. He, uh, left his phone and his passport and unloaded bags of shopping behind.”  

“So - what - Kravitz, what you’re telling me is that he was kidnapped.”  

“Uh, it is a distinct possibility, ma’am. There’s also, uh, a pool of dried blood on the doorstep, as well as some evidence of a struggle inside the house.”  

The phone goes silent except for the Director’s heavy breathing. She sounds like she’s desperately trying to keep her cool, and failing.  

“Kravitz, I’ve tried counting to ten, and I’ve realised there is no number high enough for me to count to that could calm me down.”  

“Yes, ma’am.”  

“What is the likelihood that our fugitive is the one who attacked Mr.  Hallwinter ? What does the blood work say?”  

Kravitz’s silence says everything.  

“It was him, wasn’t  it. ”  

“No, ma’am.”   

“Thank god, for that, a t   l e a s t   - ”  

“The blood is definitely alien, although it’s not genetically identical to the sample from the crash site.”  

There’s silence for a second as she thinks about that. “ So  there’s more than one dangerous alien running wild, and we have no idea where any of them are?”  

“Yes, ma’am.”  

“Kravitz,” she says, and for a brief moment he wonders if he’s going to get fired. “Find them. Immediately.”  

She hangs up and he turns around to face the assembled crime scene techs. Even from across the room, without being able to make out everything she’s said, they’re wincing at her tone. He sighs. “It’s too much to hope for that you’ve found anything, right?” They look at each other, and one of them shakes his head, looking nervous. “Okay, great.” He says, resignedly, and walks back out of the house.  

Chapter Text

Lup walks down the street, keeping her head down and her hat pulled low over her eyes. She feels like there’s people following her wherever she goes, even though she knows, logically, that no one knows of her crime. 

Yet. 

She pulls her jacket a little tighter around herself and forces herself to look up. She doesn’t want to draw attention by being cagey. There’s a female elf coming the other way, and Lup wills a friendly smile onto her face that drops as soon as the woman is out of eyesight. 

She turns into the alley that’s home to the apartment they’ve been renting, fumbling in her pockets for her key. She opens the door, glad to be in the warm of their apartment, and calls out “babe, I’m home!” 

“What’s up, Lulu?” Taako’s voice calls from the sofa. “Good day?” 

“No worse than usual,” she says. “You know, mixed some chemicals, yelled at my boss.” She hesitates, the words she wants to say stuck in her throat, but she finally chokes out, “stole a Pod’s keys off him.” 

Even from the other side of the apartment, she sees his head snap upright in shock, and she winces. 

“What - Lup -” He jumps up from the couch to face her. 

“They - they were just there, in front of me, like they were calling to me, I – Taako, this could be our opportunity to leave.” She wills him to understand; they’ve always wanted to leave, to not have to live here any more, to be free -  

“Lulu, you could be – they'd execute you if they found out.” He sounds horrified. 

“They’d have to catch me first,” she grins at him, with rather more bravado than she feels. 

“Lup, I – I can’t do this alone, I need you.” 

She gets it. He's scared. They’ve lived in the Court all their lives, and the prospect of finally being free is – exhilarating, but terrifying. 

“Taako, I need you. We can get out! We can be free!” She dangles the key in front of his face. “The rich asshole wasn’t even looking after them. Too arrogant to think a lab tech could pick his pocket. Come on, Taako. This is what we’ve fantasised about our whole lives.” 

He’s silent a moment longer, and she really starts to think he’ll refuse. She wishes she could’ve asked him first, made sure he was ready to leave, but people with access to Pods weren’t common sights, and if she’d hesitated for even a second, she’d have missed the opportunity forever. 

“Who’s even gonna fuckin’ drive the thing, Lulu?” He asks, finally, and she knows she’s got him. A grin spreads across her face. 

“Oh, come on, Koko. It’s up, down, left and right, how hard can it be? It’s not as if there’s a whole lotta shit to crash into in space.” 

“Except the planets.” 

“They’re huge, Taako, you think I can’t steer round a planet?” she grins at him, before her face settles into a more serious expression. “Ko, I – I can’t stay, now. You know that, right? I’m - they’ll work out who took the guy’s keys eventually. And I can’t stay for that. So – so I have to leave. And you – I can’t leave you behind.” 

He nods. “I know. I – I'm with you, Lup. You know I am. We stay together.” 

She’s woken up by a hand on her shoulder gently shaking her, and, through her bleary vision, she sees Barry’s face nervously looking down at her. 

“Are you okay, Lup?”  He asks. “You - you passed out, and I didn’t know what to do, I -”  

“No, no, I – I'm okay,” she says. “Been a while since I did magic. It took a lot out of me.”  

He gulps. “Uh, yeah,”  he says, “magic.”  

She grins at him. “Yeah, babe, did I not tell you? I’m a fuckin’ dope wizard. Must’ve slipped my mind.”  

He still looks a bit stunned. “I, uh – yeah.”  

“It’s just energy, Bear. You know, if you lit a lighter in front of a caveman, he’d think it was magic. It’s really science,”  she smiles. “You like science.”  

“You’re saying I’m a caveman?”  He huffs a laugh.  “I do like science, though. Do you need help getting up or can you magic that, too?”  

“I’d appreciate a hand,”  she says, and grabs his outstretched hand to pull herself out of the car seat. She hisses as the motion jolts her cut – clearly, using such flashy magic when she’s still wounded isn’t a good idea. “ Where the hell are we?”  She asks, before Barry can fuss over her. 

“I, uh, just drove and saw where it took me. This is Neverwinter. A big town, nearby to Faerun. I figured you wouldn’t want to leave, y’know, cos Taako’s still there.” He starts to head towards the building they’ve parked near, standing near her in case she collapses. 

She relaxes, letting go of tension she wasn’t even aware she’d been holding. Of course Barry wouldn’t have taken her far away from her brother. He’s so considerate, so kind to her. 

“Uh, unfortunately, I had to leave most of my shit at home,”  he says, nervously. “Thankfully I left my wallet in the car after we went shopping, but, uh, I don’t think we should use my credit cards – uh, we don’t want people to know where we are and they can trace those. Do you, uh, do you know how they found us?”  

She bites her lip. She hadn’t thought of that; she’d been so focused on what comes next that she hadn’t considered it. 

“I - I don’t know.”  

He looks like he wants to grill her on that for a split second, but he relents. “Well, anyway, we should probably not use the cards. I’ve got a couple hundred dollars in cash – we can make it last a couple weeks if we’re careful, and after that I guess I could drive a while away so they can’t find us from the ATM I used and get more out? Although maybe we shouldn’t use my car, in case they can trace my plates?”  He chuckles nervously, rubbing the back of his neck. “I have no idea how much of this is, like, bad spy movie shit, and how much of it is stuff they can really do.”  

She nods, about to reply, but then stumbles on the uneven tarmac of the parking lot, almost falling, and before either of them can think about it, his arm is round her waist to support her. 

Her mouth is suddenly dry as his body is pressed close to hers, his arm round her hips, her face only inches from hers. She looks into his eyes, and tries to work up the courage to close those final few inches between them and press her lips to his. 

And then he lets go of her waist and looks away with a mumbled apology, and she feels like her heart has been ripped from her chest. 

He doesn’t feel the same way about her. He’s so, so kind, and she desperately doesn’t want to repay his kindness by making their relationship weird. She’s resolved, numerous times, to suppress it, to say nothing to him. She doesn’t want to make this loving and considerate man uncomfortable. She’s done nothing but abuse his kindness, his generosity, and this is how she’s gonna repay him? 

They’re both silent as he leads her into the lobby of the motel he’s chosen, and he only exchanges a few words with the receptionist before turning back to her. 

“They’ve only got one room,”  he whispers as the woman turns away to grab a key. “Probably worth getting it, this place is the cheapest I could find, and we don’t want to use all our money up too fast.”  

She nods, mute, feeling like trash as he turns back with a bright smile to the receptionist, collecting their keys in exchange for a couple of notes. 

“Do you need me to help you walk?”  He asks, but she shakes her head, still silent. She doesn’t trust herself not to cry if she opens her mouth. 

She does almost stumble a couple of times as she makes her way out of the lobby and across the parking lot to their room, but she tries to hide it from Barry. She can’t face him being kind to her when she’s feeling this way. 

He opens the door to their room, and it’s clearly cheap. Barry crinkles his nose at the strong smell of cleaning products – cute, Lup thinks, before mentally slapping herself silly – and they both look around the room. 

There’s a window looking out over the parking lot, cheap-looking curtains drawn back to let the setting sun in. The steady hum of a heater draws Lup’s eyes to the large white electrical fan on the wall. A stack of paper cups sit on the table, which is positioned with two chairs. At the back of the room, there’s a door Lup assumes leads to the bathroom. There’s a TV, a potted plant that she’s almost certain is plastic, but, most pressingly of all, there’s only one bed – a double, positioned right in the centre of the room, with a heart-shaped cushion in between the two rectangular pillows.

Chapter Text

They’re sat at the table, both pretending the “one bed” thing doesn’t bother them. There’s a pepperoni pizza they got from the place next door to the motel, still in its box, untouched and going slowly cold. 

“I - don’t mind sleeping on the floor,”  Lup offers, just to break the heavy silence. 

They look down at the crusty carpet in perfect unison. There are suspicious stains covering more or less every square inch. Barry frowns. 

“No,  Lup , you – you're wounded. You sleep on the bed, I’ll take the floor. It’s only for tonight. We can find somewhere with more space tomorrow.”  

The suggestion - “why don’t we both sleep in the bed?” - dies on her lips. He’s uncomfortable touching her, why would she think he’d be fine to sleep with her? 

“Rock-paper-scissors it?”  

He chuckles. "Good to know that rock-paper-scissors is universal.”  

“One, two, three,”  Lup says, beating her fist into her palm and throwing out a scissors to Barry’s rock. 

“Wait, because I  won,  I should get to choose where I sleep,”  he says. 

“Nuh uh, babe,”  she says. “Not how it works. You won the bed.”  

He smiles, faintly, and nods. “You - you should eat. You did literal magic earlier; you need your energy.”  

She hums, grabbing up a slice. It’s greasy and fatty and she loves it. “Mmm, shit. Bear, why does anybody bother cooking their own food when this is on offer?”  He laughs, and, even feeling like she does, a small part of her revels in the noise – knowing her joke made Barry smile, but they quickly lapse into silence again. “I could probably teach you, you know,”  she says, just to fill the oppressive silence. “Magic, I mean. It’s not elf-specific. It’s just energy manipulation. Kids can do it in the Court.”  

“The Court? That’s - your home?”  

She nods. “Yeah. You probably need to learn to meditate, though. Get your energy in line with the universe’s, that kind of stuff.”  She wolfs down another slice of pizza – it’s fuckin’ good.  “My speciality is fire.”  She holds up a finger, a tiny flame alighting at the tip. “Taako’s  was always transmutation – turning something into something else.”  She tails off. 

“We’re going to find him, you know. We – we just need to get in contact with Angus somehow. Let him know where we are.”  

If Barry weren’t so kind, she’d hate how easily he can read her. Of course she’s upset about Taako; these weeks have been the longest she’s ever gone without seeing her brother and it feels  wrong  to the core, as if a vital part of her has been ripped out, and she feels guilty every time she smiles at Barry because Taako could be out there, somewhere, suffering. 

“Anyway,”  she says, “ don’t think I’ll forget that you won the toss. You’re in the bed.”  

“Damn,” he says, “you saw right through my subject-changing ruse.”  

She laughs, but inside her emotions are churning between unrequited love and guilt. 

Barry’s read bad rom-com books before. He knows exactly what a trope is, thank you very much, and he knows damn well that he’s playing right into it. 

But unfortunately, he can’t think of any other ways out. He can’t bring himself to suggest to Lup that they share the bed – she's still uncomfortable with his touch, and after the incident in the parking lot he doesn’t want to freak her out. He already feels terrible – he couldn’t keep his hands to himself and now he’s upset her. 

He lays the pillow down on the floor, and lays out the duvet for her. If she’s gonna sleep on the floor, it’s the least he can do. 

It’s only when the time comes for them to actually get in bed that he thinks about the pyjamas situation. He was planning to sleep in his underwear, but there’s only one duvet, and he’s already given up his rights on that. He doesn’t want to sleep nearly naked in front of Lup without any covers. Is he gonna have to sleep fully clothed? He’s wearing jeans! 

Before he gets the chance to make a decision, he sees her wince again, holding her stomach. She thinks she’s slick, hiding her pain from him, but he’s caught her cringing at least half a dozen times since they left his house. 

“Lup , there’s no way I’m letting you sleep on the floor,”  he says. Is it okay to say it? Will she freak out? “You - you’re wounded. Maybe we should – uh, maybe we should share the bed? If, uh, if you’re okay with that?”  

She looks away, and he knows he’s fucked up. 

He’s too kind to her, she thinks. She has to look away; she doesn’t want him seeing the expression on her face for fear he’ll somehow just  know  how she feels. He’s so obviously uncomfortable asking, and she hates that he’s in this position, but – she really doesn’t want to sleep on the floor. Her wound is healing, sure, but it’s still uncomfortable even when she lies in an actual bed. 

"Okay, if – if you’re sure you don’t mind giving up your rightful rock-paper-scissors winnings,”  she says trying to disguise her offering him an out as a joke. He smiles, and it seems genuine. 

She watches as he grabs the pillow and duvet back up off the floor, rearranging them back on the bed, and then he slips under the covers fully clothed. 

“Barry, is that – you're gonna sleep in jeans?”  

He flushes a little. “Well, uh – I don’t - I’ve not got any pyjamas.”  

She hadn’t even considered that she was going to have to strip down to sleep next to him. “Oh, I – okay,”  she says. “That’s fair. I’m - do you mind if I strip down a little? Just - I'll take my bra off and keep the shirt on, and strip down to my shorts.”  

“No, of course, whatever – whatever makes you comfortable.”  He looks deeply uncomfortable, but she really doesn’t want to sleep in her clothes, so she quickly pulls her own jeans off and reaches up under her shirt to pull her bra off. She tosses them across the room and quickly scoots under the blanket, trying to preserve her modesty for his sake. 

Barry’s pretty uncomfortable. Jeans aren’t a great thing to sleep in at the best of times, and it doesn’t help that Lup’s sharing a bed with him, only half-clothed -  

He desperately tries to tear his mind away from those thoughts. He doesn’t need his jeans to get any tighter, thanks. He starts running through the periodic table in alphabetic order – anything to get his mind off Lup. 

“Are you sure you’re okay in jeans?”  She asks. 

He tries to force a smile onto his face and nods. “Yeah,  Lup , of course. You know, if I take ‘ em  off I cease to exist, so...”  

She smiles back, starting to look a little less uncomfortable now. There’s a couple of beats of silence, with only the sounds of the heater and their breathing. “Barry, can we talk? What’s our plan? How are we going to find Angus? We – we can't stay on the run forever.”  

“Lup , I – I don’t know. We have to hide for at least a few days, right? We know those elves are after us, we can’t go back to  Faerun  for a couple of days at least. Maybe – maybe for now we should just focus on the short term. We – we'll give Angus a couple of days to find  Taako , right? And that also means those elves will hopefully leave  Faerun  to look for us elsewhere, so we can go back and find Angus and  Taako  and then work on solving the bigger issue.”  He sighs. “ I just hope  Sildar  will be okay. Hopefully one of my neighbours will feed him or something.”  

She’s so grateful that he’s put together enough to think this through. There’s some part of her that just wants to dissolve into panic, wants to curl up and hide, even though she knows she can’t; Barry’s got a life here, and Taako’s still missing. 

“Okay, Barry, you’re right,”  she says. “I know we’ve only just been shopping but since we had to leave all our new shit behind maybe we should get some clothes? Especially pyjamas, so you don’t have to sleep in jeans.”  

He chuckles. “That would be nice. We should probably get some food, too. Something microwavable, since we don’t have an oven  any more .”  

“Ooh, yeah, I wanted to try some of those ready meals. They look really good.”  

“I promise they aren’t as good as they look. Those devious bastards are good at making packaging, but shit at making actual food.”  She giggles, but the noise is drowned out by the heater coughing violently. “ Shit, what the hell was that?”  

He jumps up, and walks over to the heater. It’s been running more or less constantly since they arrived in the room; even though it’s late spring, now, it’s been unseasonably cold. The heater was more or less the only thing Barry was happy for in their shitty room, and now it seems to have packed up. 

"Fuck,”  he says. “It’s stopped working.”  He mashes the power button, hoping to spark something in the machine, but nothing happens. 

“Can you ask at reception?”  Lup sits up in the bed and draws the duvet tight around her neck. 

He pulls a face. He’d like to – the cold is already nipping at his extremities, and it’s only been a minute since the heater packed up – but he suspects the reception desk is long closed, since it’s only a small motel, and opening the door to go check it out is only going to let the heat out. “There’s probably no one there right now. I’ll have to ask in the morning.”  

He hurries back to the bed, drawing the covers around him. Lup squawks as he pulls the duvet and it leaves her exposed. “Hey!”  

He laughs, and she reaches over him to pull the blanket back, leaving him out in the cold, and it’s his turn to make indignant noises. He tries to pull the duvet from her grip but she wraps herself up in it like a burrito, using her body to hold the edges of the blanket down. She flashes him a cocky grin. “Oh, is that how it is, huh?”  He says, and lifts her up to pull the duvet out from underneath her. She squeals, and playfully pushes at him, but he’s not to be deterred, and he tears the duvet off her and retreats back to his own side of the bed with it. 

He’s just starting to think she’s given up, and beginning to consider relenting and sharing the duvet with her, when she jumps on him, straddling his legs to try to pull the duvet from his grip. He bucks his hips to try to shake her off, wriggling under her, and she loses balance and falls flat on top of him with a squeak of surprise. 

She lands with her hands either side of his chest, and her face only an inch from his. They’re both breathing heavily and laughing. He looks into her eyes, and she looks into his, and they both slowly stop laughing. 

“Barry,”  she breathes. 

 It’s so easy for him to just reach up and kiss her. 

Her lips are soft and warm and her body against his feels  right,  but - 

She stiffens in surprise, and he immediately feels overwhelmingly guilty, pulling away. “Shit, I – I'm so sorry,  Lup , I don’t know what I was thinking -”  

And her mouth crashes into his, and his mind goes utterly blank as he kisses her again. 

Chapter Text

Barry’s eyes flitter open, and for a moment he’s confused – where is he? This isn’t his house? - and then Lup stirs next to him and it all comes back. 

He grins and grabs his glasses from the bedside table. He rolls over, careful not to disturb her, to look at her face. Her mouth is hanging open, and her hair is a rat’s nest, but she’s still strikingly beautiful. He reaches out and pushes a stray strand off her face. 

He’s really glad he didn’t have to sleep in jeans. 

She closes her mouth and her eyes flicker slowly open. “Hey, babe,”  she smiles at him, sleepily. 

“Hey yourself,”  he says. 

She leans over and kisses him – not like their kisses last night, desperate and passionate, but chaste and quick. “I need a shower,”  she says. “What’re the chances they’ll have hot water?”  

He laughs. “Yeah, I don’t think we’ll get that lucky.”  

She throws the duvet off herself, and heads over to the bathroom. “You could come keep me warm?”  she says, wearing a broad grin and nothing else, and he’s almost embarrassed by how quickly he’s out of bed. 

Neverwinter is a beach town, and, as Barry drives down Main Street, he sees Lup glued to the windows, watching the sea. 

“You good?”  He says, and she jumps slightly at his words. He hadn’t realised quite how engrossed she was. 

“Yeah, babe, all good over here,”  she smiles. 

“We can stop off and go down to the beach if you want,”  he offers, and tries not to laugh at the way her eyes widen in excitement. 

“Shit, can we?”  

He pulls over into a parking space, and a thought strikes him. Lup’s clearly never seen a beach before. Does her world not have oceans? She’d said, before, that there wasn’t a lot of nature in her home... 

He takes her arm as they cross the road and walk down onto the beach. He kicks off his shoes to stand on the sand, and she mimics his actions even though she’s wearing sandals already. 

“It’s so big,”  she says, in awe, but she turns and slaps at his arm. “Don’t say anything.”  

He grins and wiggles his eyebrows. She rolls her eyes, but laughs too. 

“The most water I’ve ever seen is in a pool. Can we swim?”  she says, pulling at his sleeve. 

He tries not to let the sadness show. He never learned to swim, but he doesn’t want to admit that to her – he's a full-grown man, he should definitely be able to. 

“Uh, not unless you’ve got a swimming costume hidden on you somewhere,”  he says, trying to keep his tone light. “They’re not big on public nudity on earth.”  

Her smile dips for a second, before she points down at her bare legs. "I’m in a skirt, babe, I’m  gonna  go paddling.”  

Her grin is infectious, and he can’t bring himself to rain on her parade, and so he leans down to roll his jeans up above the knee. Before he can even say anything, she says, “ race you!”  and disappears off down the beach. 

“Hey!”  He dashes after her. “False start!”  

She splashes into the water up to knee depth, shrieking at the cold; it's overcast and cool and the water is absolutely fucking freezing. He follows her in, a little cautiously – he's heard all kinds of things about sudden depths and riptides and – and then he sees her smiling at him and she looks so happy that he can’t stop himself from grinning back. 

The grin drops when she splashes him with that cold, cold water and he yells before splashing her back. 

Lup sticks close to his side as he leads her into the Neverwinter Mall. He can’t keep the grin off his face as her hand finds his. 

It’s busy, but it’s a weekday, so Barry knows it’s probably a lot quieter than other times. He’d taken Lup to get the essentials – pyjamas, toothbrushes, food, a change of clothes. Barry’s a little frustrated that he’d only just finished unloading the car when those elves attacked him – if only he’d been just a little lazier, they wouldn’t have to be shopping right now. 

But then Lup squeezes his hand, and that frustration dissipates. How could he possibly feel anything but giddy joy? 

The food court is right near the entrance to the mall, and so they stop off there first. Lup gets him to order her something from an east Asian fusion takeaway place – some sushi and a pot of noodles – and so Barry orders himself a katsu curry. 

“So you weren’t joking? This is for real just raw fish?”  

He laughs. “Yeah, it’s good, though.”  

She sniffs it suspiciously. “I only ordered it to call your bluff. I thought you were pulling a goof.”  He reaches over onto her cardboard plate and snatches one of her sushi rolls, taking a bite before she can stop him. “Hey!”  

He chews. “It’s good,”  he says, with his mouth full. 

She scowls at him and pops one in her mouth. Her eyes widen. “Oh, shit, okay.”  He laughs, but it turns into an indignant squawk as she reaches over with her chopsticks to grab some of his chicken. She’s not developed the knack of using the chopsticks, yet, so she drops most of it on the table, but she still looks smug as she shovels the remainder in her mouth. “Payback,”  she grins at him. 

He scowls good-naturedly. “You win this round.”  She laughs, and he grins at the sound. 

“Oh, shit, babe,”  Lup  says, her eye caught by the colourful display racks. “I totally let you off last time, but this time I’m gonna choose you some outfits.”  

He groans. “Oh, no.”  

“Hey! My sense of style is impeccable!”  She bats at his arm. 

“No, like. On you, sure. I just like my jeans.”  

“I’ll find you something,”  she says, and reaches past him to grab a red jacket off the rack. “What about this? I bet you’d look dope in red.”  

He smiles at her in a way that lays bare his affection (how did she overlook those smiles for so long? What a nerd, she thinks, affectionately, ignoring the way her own heart skips a beat – lame, she tells herself, she’s seen him naked, she shouldn’t be getting all flustered at a smile) and shrugs the jacket on. 

“It’s totally your colour! We’re definitely getting that. Shit, we could totally match, grab me one too.”  He does, and she shrugs off the jacket she was wearing to pull it on. “Rad. We look like a biker gang or something.”  That smile of his is back, and she leans down to press a kiss into his lips. “ Okay, now I just gotta grab you a hat. Something rakish, mysterious. Really cement you as a man of mystery.”  

He laughs. “If you get to pick me a hat, I should get to pick one for you. It’s only fair.”  

“Okay, but if you think you can find a hat that’ll make this,” she indicates herself, “look silly, you’re sadly mistaken,”  she grins. “ We should split up and meet back here in ten minutes with the hats. I hope you’re ready to wear something truly ridiculous, babe.”  

“Okay, I hope you’re ready to wear the biggest, floppiest sombrero I can find,”  he grins back. 

Lup waits for Barry to wander out of sight, and then she dashes back towards the hat stand she saw by the entrance of the store. She hides behind the stands and peeks out to ensure Barry hasn’t secretly followed her – if he has, he must have rogue training – and she grabs the wizard’s hat she’d seen. It's tall, purple, and emblazoned with stars. It's hideous, and it’s just the kind of thing Taako would love.  

She tries to discretely shove it into the bag of clothes she’s already buying. This one isn’t for Barry to wear, it’s a gift for when she finds her brother again. And she will. 

She’s trying to decide whether a ridiculous pink fedora would look better on Barry than a red top hat (she decides on the top hat; it even matches his new jacket!) when she happens to glance out of the doors of the shop. 

It’s a large retail unit opening straight out onto the atrium of the mall’s second floor. From the second floor, Lup can easily see down to the ground level. And what she sees is her brother. 

He’s talking to a kid – wait, is that Angus? – and a tall black man – holy shit, that’s the FBI guy who came to talk to Barry. 

She drops her bags and sprints out of the store. 

Chapter Text

Taako’s woken up by the lights in his room flicking on. “Ah, fuck, what the hell?”  He mumbles, pulling the pillow over his eyes. “Fuck off, Lulu, lemme alone,”  he says into the blissful darkness. 

“Sir, it’s eleven thirty. You need to get up or we’re going to waste the whole day.”  

“Agnes?”  Taako  says, tossing the pillow aside and sitting up. “How the fuck did you get in here?”  

“I picked the lock, sir. It wasn’t hard.”  The kid says, and Taako scowls to stop himself laughing and keep up his grumpy facade. 

“Remind me to barricade my door tomorrow,”  he replies, tossing the duvet off and getting up. 

“Come on, sir. You wanted to search hotels.”  

“That’s a bald-faced lie,”  Taako  protests. “I wanted to order room service. Lulu can wait, they’ve got lobster thermidor.”  

The kid rolls his eyes, and so Taako flicks him on the nose. “Sir, please hurry up and get dressed. I’ve been ready since eight o’clock.”  

“Okay, okay,”  Taako says, shooing Angus back out the door. 

He still doesn’t have a toothbrush, he reflects, as he gets his clothes on. These weeks can’t be doing his gums any favours. Maybe he should go shopping, grab some essentials. He could probably make his own lobster cheaper and better than what they’re serving here. 

He throws the door open and strikes a pose. “ How do I look?”  He says. Angus looks bemused. 

“You’re wearing the same clothes as yesterday, sir.”  

“Yeah, and they’re fuckin’ fancy clothes,”  he says. Before the conversation can dissolve into more bickering, though, he follows it up with, “where are we starting, kid? You’re the fuckin’ genius, right?”  

The kid nods. “I am, actually, sir. I have an IQ of -”  

“Okay, no bragging, pumpkin. My IQ is, like, 69, so beat that.”  

“Sir, that’s a really bad score.”  

“Nah, Ango, it’s like golf. The lower your score the better. They probably just told you that your really high score was good so you wouldn’t cry, or whatever.”  Angus scowls, and  Taako  ruffles his hair. “C’mon, Agnes, in all seriousness, I don’t even know where to begin. I’ll follow your lead.”  

Angus brightens up at that – Taako tries to suppress the way he feels affectionate watching the kid grin – and says, “well, sir, I think we go to the cheapest hotels on the east side of town – the side nearest to Faerun. I’ve got a picture of Miss  Lup  I took while we were looking for you, so we can ask if anyone’s seen her.”  

“Okay, okay,” Taako says. “Let’s get going then, Ango, time’s a-wastin'.”  

“You - sir, you slept until midday. My two-minute explanation of the plan is hardly an issue compared to that.”  

Taako grins as he bickers with the kid. It feels familiar. Saying the kid reminded him of himself when he was that age would maybe be too strong – he wasn’t a certified genius at ten – but it’s the same kind of banter he has with Lup, and it detracts from the ache in his chest to talk him. 

“Hello, sir! Have you seen this woman?” Angus says, showing the receptionist the photo. She looks at it, thinking hard, but Taako can already tell she hasn’t met Lup. The twins aren’t the kind of people you forget in a hurry. 

This is their third shitty hotel. Taako’s bored of process of elimination. 

“I’m bored of process of elimination,”  he says. “ Can’t we just, like, hack into the traffic cameras and find his car?”  

“Sure thing, sir! Can you hack into a government database?”  

Taako grumbles. “You’re the boy genius. You do it.”  

He rolls his eyes. “Come on, sir. We should do just a few more hotels and then we can take a break for lunch.”  

Angus starts to head towards the exit of the lobby. “Angooooo,”  Taako  moans, following him. “I’m so bored. This is the most boring thing I’ve ever done.”  The kid looks ready to reply, but he suddenly stops dead in his tracks.  Taako  looks up and groans. “Oh, not this again.”  

Kravitz has not been having a good couple of days. 

He’d tried tracing Barry Hallwinter’s credit cards. No luck. His kidnappers are obviously too smart to use them. He’d tried tracing his car, but even Kravitz hadn’t expected that to work – there's not a lot of traffic cameras in Faerun. It’s a small town, after all. 

He’s given up looking for Hallwinter, and instead started looking for the kid. 

A woman on a bus remembered seeing a kid and an elf, clearly not related, getting on a bus to Neverwinter. He’d seized on that lead like a drowning man grabs a plank of driftwood, and followed them. He’d figured that the kid would probably need to rent a hotel – somewhere cheap, because he’s a kid and the elf’s an alien, so they probably don’t have much money. He’s been taking security footage from the Davy Lamp of the pair to different hotel owners around the area, not getting much luck. 

Until that morning. 

Kravitz had shown them the photo, and they halfling behind the counter immediately said yes, he recognised the pair. Not as customers, though – they'd been asking about a missing human, average height, glasses, looks a little like Tom Arnold, and an elf, who they had a photo of. 

Kravitz had sent a message of thanks to any god listening. 

Now he’s on their trail. The duo are on foot, walking from hotel to hotel, looking for a pair that sounds – Kravitz realises – a lot like Barry and his girlfriend. Kravitz starts to feel pretty dumb when he realises that Barry’s girlfriend and the guy who’d tentacled him in the bar look pretty damn similar, and that he wasn’t actually sure that she’d ever  said  she was his girlfriend. Had he really just made that assumption? Was Barry Hallwinter, the photo next to the word “average” in the dictionary, living with an alien? 

He walks into the next hotel that he hopes the pair would have visited, and as he scans the lobby, he sees them, both glaring at him. 

“Wait!” He says, putting his hands up. “Tell your friend not to tentacle me!” 

“Sir, wait!”  Angus says. “I - I don’t think he’s going to attack us. And it’s too public, here, anyway. We don’t want to draw attention.”  

Taako lowers his outstretched hands, but doesn’t stop glaring suspiciously at the guy. 

“Okay,” Angus says. “We’re listening. What is it?” 

“Uh - huh, I hadn’t expected that to work,” the guy says. “I don’t know what to say, now.” 

“You can start with your name,” Angus says. 

“Sure. It’s Kravitz.” 

“Angus,” Angus points at himself and then at Taako. “Taako.” 

“Nice to meet you. Listen, I – we should talk. Can we go somewhere a little less obvious?” He indicates the receptionist, who’s put his book down to watch the confrontation with one eyebrow raised. 

“He wants us to go somewhere private.”  

“Fuck no!”  Taako  spits. “ I’m not going to no secondary location with this guy.  Lemme  give you a piece of advice,  li’l  man: ACAB.”  

Kravitz has a bemused expression on his face watching Taako talk. Angus is sure he can work out what’s being said just by the tone. “He’s suspicious,” he says, and Kravitz nods, raising an eyebrow as if to say ‘really? I couldn’t tell,’ but he stays silent as Angus turns back to Taako. “Sir, listen, I think we should hear him out. I don’t think he’s here to hurt us. If he was, he wouldn’t have come alone. Not after last time.”  

Taako’s nose scrunches up as he thinks.  “Tell him we’ll talk, but somewhere public. That wine place we saw, in the mall. Tell him he’s buying.”  

“He says he’ll talk to you, but only if you buy him lunch.” 

Kravitz laughs. “Well, I can manage that.” 

Angus watches as Taako flops down at the pottery wheel, Kravitz opposite him, each with a glass of wine in their hands. This is a weird establishment, he thinks. Chug’n’squeeze? Really? 

He grabs his grape soda from the bar and sits on the floor next to Taako, who’s already started on a vase. 

“Ask him what he wants, and what he did with my fucking sister.”  

“He wants to know if you know where Miss Lup is.” 

“Lup?” Kravitz looks confused, and Angus thinks it’s authentic. 

“Yeah, his twin sister.” 

Realisation dawns on Kravitz’s face. “Ah, right, that clears things up. I – I'm sorry, I’ve got no idea where she is.” 

“He says he doesn’t know where she is. I believe him.”  Taako nods, still looking suspicious and bitter. “What do you want with Mr. Taako, sir?” 

Kravitz winces. “That’s a pretty complicated question. I work for an organisation that catalogues and regulates alien artefacts on earth. We – as far as I’m aware, we’ve never met a live alien before, but we’re the good guys. We’ll probably just want to learn about your home, that kind of stuff. I assume we’ll issue you a new identity.” 

Angus translates that for Taako, who seems to grow even more suspicious. “And I’m supposed to believe that? He might want to lock me and Lup up. Just cos he’s handsome doesn’t mean I trust him.”  Taako  looks him up and down. “Although he is certainly handsome.”  

“He says he doesn’t trust you.” 

“Did you tell him I think he’s handsome? Tell him that,”  Taako  says. “ Man, it’s weird to have to flirt through a baby.”  

“I’m not a baby,”  Angus scowls. “He wants me to say you’re handsome.” 

Kravitz looks surprised, but laughs nonetheless. “Well, I’m definitely never going to forget our first meeting.” 

“He says your hat is ridiculous.”  Angus lies, just to get back at him for the baby comment, and Taako squawks. 

“It is not! This hat cost me, like, fifty dollars -”  

Angus rolls his eyes and Taako’s outburst dies off into a string of mumbled complaints. 

“When was the last time you saw Lup?” Kravitz asks, interrupting the squabble before it can really begin, and Angus can appreciate the question. It’s one he’d ask if he was investigating. 

“With Mr. Barry. I think they had to flee someone attacking them, maybe.” 

Kravitz looks curious. “Really? We thought they were kidnapped.” 

“And the kidnappers took his car?” 

“Yeah, they put him and Lup in the back and -” 

“Come on, sir. You can surely do better than that. Why would they walk to his house – on the outskirts of town – only to put him in the back of his own car, which we could trace? No, they had their own vehicle, which means Mr. Barry and Miss Lup drove away in their car, and the would-be kidnappers left in their vehicle empty-handed.” 

Kravitz frowns, and Angus thinks he maybe went too far. Adults really don’t like being patronised by a ten-year-old, even if that ten-year-old is a certified genius. “No, okay, that makes sense actually,” he says. “Good deductions there, kid.” Angus grins. 

“What are you two nerds saying?”  Taako says. He’s squished his vase flat into a bowl, now, but as Angus watches he starts working it back upwards again into a vague mug-shape. 

“Just exchanging information. He’s looking for Lup too,”  Angus says. “ Sir, I really think we should work with him. He's got resources that we don’t have.”  

“Yeah, but, also, he couldn’t find me, and a literal baby did.”  

Angus pulls a face. That is true, even if he’s nearly a teen, not a baby. A tween. He’s ten, is what he’s trying to say. 

“Sir, I really think we could use the help. Worst case scenario, you can tentacle him again and we both run away.”  

Taako looks at Kravitz through suspicious eyes, but then drops the act and grins. “Well, I’m down for some company that isn’t a  newborn  baby, and even if he’s trying to arrest me, at least he’s eye candy. Tell him we can work together, but only if he apologises and says my hat is sexy.”  

Chapter Text

Taako’s laughing. When was the last time he laughed like this? 

It’s pretty easy to flirt with Kravitz, even with the language barrier – a wink there, a flirty grin here, and the dude’s blushing and stammering and trying not to let on to Angus what’s happening. It helps that Taako’s got half a bottle of very good wine in him on an empty stomach, lowering his inhibitions. It’s the first time he’s had a drink in three weeks, he’s allowed to be a little bit tipsy, leave him alone. 

They’re stood outside the Chug’n’squeeze, and Taako looks down at Angus. “Okay, kid, where we headed?”  Taako says to the kid, shooting Kravitz a smile over his head, gratified at the way he flushes and looks away. 

“Well, sir, I was thinking we go -”  

And suddenly all hell breaks loose. 

Kravitz is set upon by a red and blonde cannonball, shoving him to the ground, and then Lup’s hand is in his, and it feels right, but she’s pulling at him and saying “T, we  gotta fuckin’ go, come on -”  

“Lulu?”  He’s stunned. “What - Lup, stop, it’s chill, he’s chill!”  

“He’s chill? Taako, the dude’s a cop, c’mon. Ango , tell him, come ON!” 

“Miss Lup! It’s okay, I promise! Mr. Kravitz is cool!”  

Kravitz landed flat on his ass, and he starts to stand and brush himself off, but Lup snarls, and he sits back down. Something of a crowd is starting to form around them. 

“Lulu, come on. He’s chill. Trust me.”  Taako offers Kravitz a hand, and smiles a little at the way he hesitates for a second before grabbing it. 

Lup pauses for a moment longer, and then hurls herself at Taako, wrapping her arms around his neck. “Gods, Taako, I was worried.”  He hugs her back, pulling her close to him. 

“You were worried? You bled all over me and fucked off into the night -”  

“Shit, yeah, are you wounded? Are you okay?”  

A crowd is starting to form around them, but Taako’s oblivious to them. “Yeah, goofus, I’m fine. What about you?”  

“I’m okay now, Barry helped me – Oh, shit, Barry, I left him upstairs – oh, fuck.”  She pulls away from  Taako  and looks around, noticing the crowd. “We should go, there’s - there’s some people looking for us – elves, cops, from the Court, we shouldn’t be drawing attention.”  

“Shit, really?”  Taako  scans the assembled people. “Okay we gotta fuckin’ go. Let’s get out of here.”  

“We gotta find Barry. He – I left him in the shop, he’s looked after me.”  

“I should’ve known you’d be living the high life with some rich asshole. I’ve been living under an overpass and you’ve been eating caviar and shit.”  

“Shit, Koko, really? I’m so sorry.”  She squeezes his hand in hers. “Are you okay?”  

He grins – knowing she’ll be able to see the pain he’s hiding, but nonetheless – and says, “fuckin’ of course. Taako’s  good.”  

Angus has been watching the exchange with rabid interest, Kravitz with bemused incomprehension. “Come on, pumpkin, we’re heading out. Tell Krav, wouldja ?”  

Taako turns back as the kid starts talking in common to see Lup with an eyebrow raised and a grin that could only be described as shit-eating. “Pumpkin? Krav?”  

He pulls his hat down over his eyes so she can't see his face. “Shut the fuck up.”  

Taako’s saved the embarrassment of Lup mocking him further when a voice rings out from the crowd. “Here you are,”  it says. 

“We’ve been looking all over for you,”  a second voice joins the first. 

Lup swings around to see two elves push their way out of the crowd – the two she’d hit outside Barry’s house. She’s pretty satisfied to see the male elf still has a crooked nose from where she hit him. 

“Oh, you guys again?”  She says. “Hey, you’ve got a little something... on your face...”  she indicates her nose, and then squints at him. “Oh, my bad.”  

He scowls at her and opens his mouth to reply, but the other elf cuts in. “Now, come on, Edward. She’s not worth it.”  She smiles, exposing her sharp teeth. "Besides, after we arrest this bitch we’ll have plenty of time to get even.”  

“You’re right, Lydia, as always,”  the male elf says. The pair strike a pose. 

“Who’s this?” Kravitz whispers as the elves vogue to music only they can hear. 

“I’m honestly not even sure,” Angus whispers back. “They didn’t really explain, they just started dancing.” 

“Oh,” he whispers back. “They’re definitely the same species as these two, then.” 

“So this is who the Court sends to collect the first runaways in two thousand years?”  Taako  says, seemingly to  Lup , but loud enough Edward and Lydia can hear it. “Some fuckin’ nerds?”  

“Yeah, apparently. If we have to fight, go for the noses, they break super easy.”  

Edward snarls, and he says, “Lydia, I’ve had enough playing. Let’s fuck ‘em up.”  He holds a fist in the air, and a black flame ignites around it. Lydia grins, and raises her own hand palm up, and a ball of crackling yellow energy erupts from her palm, sparking violently. 

There are screams from the crowd, and then suddenly the atrium of the mall is a throng of bodies as people push to get away from the fight. 

“Hey, Ango, get Krav outta  here, wouldja? This is gonna be a full-on magic fight, and these two are gonna do a hell of a lot worse than – oh, shit,”  Taako  says, dodging Edward’s necrotic fireball, "A hell of a lot worse than tentacle him.”  

Angus nods and grabs Kravitz by the sleeve. He looks like he’s gonna protest, but upon seeing Edward’s magic he relents and lets himself be dragged away. 

Lup hurls a fireball of her own at Lydia, who’s forced to drop her lightning and duck. “You tentacled him? Aw, Koko. You only do that to guys you really like.”  

Taako stops fighting for a second to glower at her. Then he’s back to business, casting a spell at the floor that doesn’t seem to do anything until Lydia steps forward, when the linoleum tiles turn into the consistency of quicksand and start sucking her down. She shrieks in a very satisfyingly high-pitched and terrified way. 

Lup swings round to check Kravitz and Angus are out of range - they're riding an escalator back upstairs. “Find Barry, Angus! Get him out of here! We’ll find you later!”  

“Barry? Is that the delightful specimen from before?”  Lydia grins a predatory grin and shoots a beam of crystal-blue light that nearly hits Taako, but he ducks, and it burns a hole through his hat. He yells, and Lup thinks he’s probably angrier at the hat-shot than he would’ve been if it’d hit him in the head. 

“You won’t need to worry about finding them, dear,”  Edward says. “We’ll be taking you back to the Court, and killing them. Collateral damage, I’m afraid. I’m sure we can let you see him one last time, though. Maybe even a farewell kiss for the condemned man?”  

Lup doesn’t let herself rise to the bait, but she would admit that it’s even more satisfying than usual when he has to pat out the flames that have caught his clothes from a glancing shot. 

Kravitz is, mostly, worried for Taako and Lup. Sure. A close second to that emotion is embarrassment that he had to be dragged away by Angus, who is ten years old. 

His training has kicked in, though, at last, and he’s trying to direct people away from the fight. A woman runs past with a baby and stumbles, and he catches her before she can fall. She barely even looks at him before she keeps running, and Kravitz has to dodge the next wave of stampeding shoppers. 

He’d shoved Angus behind a vending machine and told him to stay put – he doesn’t want the kid getting trampled. He hopes Angus is smart enough to do as he’s told and keep his head down. 

Barry’s not sure what’s happening. There’s an alarm ringing – the fire alarm? Gods, he hopes that wasn’t Lup. 

He’s trying to swim against the current, battling the crowd to fight his way further into the mall. “Lup!” He shouts, but he barely hears himself above the shouting of the crowd and the alarm. “Lup!” He tries again. 

Then he spots Angus being swept along. The kid’s short, even for a ten-year-old, and so he’s having to practically run to keep ahead of a swarm of tourists. As Barry watches, the kid’s sucked into the crowd. 

“Fuck,” he mutters to himself, and, with a final glance around for Lup, he turns and runs back towards Angus. 

Lup takes a bolt of energy to her shoulder, and Taako covers her while she recovers. Taako takes an elbow to the ribs, and Lup steps in, fists flying, to give him the space to get his breath back. They operate as a team, perfectly complementing each other. 

It gives them an edge. Edward and Lydia won’t cover each other – they fight as two separate people, and the twins are good at exploiting it. Taako feigns exhaustion to lure Lydia in, and then catches her with a tentacle to the legs that knocks her flat, while Lup keeps Edward busy by hurling cutlery from a nearby cake stall at him. 

“So, what’s been happening with you?”  Lup  asks as she hits Edward with a folding chair, kicking him in the ribs as he crumples. “You lived under an overpass and still had time to meet a hot dude?”  

“Yeah, I mean, Krav came to arrest me or whatever so I tentacled him.”  Taako  takes a shot with a couple of magic missiles at Lydia, who ducks behind a table. One of the three projectiles still  makes contact, and she yells in pain. “What about you? Anything I should know about this Barry dude?”  

Lup pulls Edward’s immaculately styled hair and scratches at his eyes, but even while somewhat distracted she can hear the grin in Taako’s voice. She’s almost glad they’re in a fight for their lives – he probably doesn’t see the way she practically flinches at his question. “Nope. Nothing to know about Barry at all.”  

Lydia grins. “Isn’t it nice that they’re catching up, Eddie? Almost makes you wish we didn’t have to arrest them, doesn’t it?”  

Edward snarls, and gets a solid punch in on Taako’s chest. He reels back, and Edward grins. “No. In fact, I’m looking forward to seeing her face when we kill her precious Barry.”  

Lup grits her teeth and steps in to allow Taako some time to recover, but Lydia summons a spectral sword and takes a slash. She’s forced backwards, and Lydia stands over Taako and raises the sword and -  

Chapter Text

A shot rings out from above, and Lup swings around to see Kravitz leaning over the railing, brandishing a pistol. He fires a second shot, and it ricochets off the ground near Lydia's feet – he's intentionally missing, trying to force her away from Taako and not outright kill her. 

It works, sending Lydia stumbling backwards. She drops the sword, and Lup grabs for it, but it vanishes in a puff of sickly yellow smog before she can put a hand on it. Taako blows a kiss, and Kravitz blushes. Seconds later, though, he’s forced to duck behind the rails as Edward fires a blast of energy that strikes the fencing Kravitz was taking cover behind, and it erupts in a fireball. Lup really hopes he moved before that explosion. 

Regardless, Taako’s got his breath back, and he tosses another fireball at Edward before stepping in close to Lup. 

“We need to get out of here.They’re after us, not the humans.”  

“Okay, agreed.”  

She holds out her hand and whispers a few quick words. 

Barry grabs Angus from the throng of people by the forearm, pulling him backwards into a shop’s doorway, set back away from the crowd. 

“Shit, Angus, how did you get here? What happened?” 

“Sir, I found Mr. Taako! And then we found Miss Lup, but there’s some elves fighting them -” 

“A male and a female? Blonde? Really beautiful?” 

“Yes, sir!” 

“Shit,” Barry says. “Uh, sugar, I mean.” 

“Sir, I’m ten, I’ve heard cuss words before.” 

Then, Lup’s voice rings out, loud, but somehow all around him, as if it's coming from hidden speakers. “Bear, we’re gonna draw them away. Find Angus and Kravitz. We’ll meet you back at our hotel later.” 

Barry swings around, but Lup’s nowhere to be seen. “What the -” 

“Sir?” Angus looks confused. 

“Did you – you didn’t hear Lup talking, right?” 

“No, sir?” he says. “Are you okay?” 

“Yeah, uh, yeah. I’m fine. Any idea who Kravitz is?” 

Kravitz rolls away from the railing and it explodes into shrapnel. A couple of pieces lacerate his arms as he brings them up to cover his face, but he’s mostly unscathed. 

His hands are empty, though, and he realises he’s dropped his gun. He scans the ground and spots it by a storefront, and so he runs to grab it, keeping low in case those two elves spot him. 

He scoops it up and runs back to the edge of the walkway – now mostly a crater from Edward’s spell – and peeks over quickly. 

He doesn’t see anything. No Taako, no Lup, no Edward, no Lydia. 

What he does see is Barry Hallwinter, peeking out of a shop. Angus is with him, and the kid looks up and spots him. Barry follows his gaze and waves awkwardly. 

Kravitz sighs, and starts walking down the escalator. Barry looks increasingly nervous as he approaches. It’s probably not helped by the fact Kravitz still has his gun out. 

“Uh, hi,” he says. “What, uh, what’s up?” 

Kravitz stares blankly. “We just fought two aliens who threw fireballs, and you say “what’s up?”” 

“Well, yeah, I mean, I didn’t know what else to say. Last time I saw you I thought you were gonna arrest me and chuck me in alien jail.” 

“We don’t have alien jail.” 

“Oh, thank God. Until you said that, I was still pretty sure you were gonna chuck me in alien jail.” 

“Sir, I think they’d just throw you in regular jail. They wouldn’t need a special jail,” Angus interjects. 

“Oh, shit. Sugar, I mean.” 

“Sir, you can swear.” 

“I’m not gonna throw you in jail. I don’t even think you’ve committed any crimes,” Kravitz says. He holds up a hand before Barry can say anything more. “Do you have any idea where Taako and Lup went? As fun as this is, I’d like to find them before those other aliens fucking kill them.” He looks down. “Sorry, Angus.” 

Angus scowls. “Sir, please.” 

“Uh, yeah, I think they’re leading them away. I’m assuming they think they can lose them. Lup said she’ll meet us back at our hotel.” 

Kravitz nods. “Okay. Okay. That makes sense. Okay.” Kravitz takes a deep, calming breath. “Okay. Fine. I’m gonna take you to see my boss.” 

Lucretia puts her head in her hands. “Kravitz...” He winces. “You understand that this is not the scenario I wanted, right? You understand that this is absolutely not what I had hoped would happen?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

“In fact,” she says, “this could easily be described as the nightmare scenario. Can you see why I’d say that?” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

“You let all four aliens do very public property damage, then they escaped, and instead you brought me a child and a guy.” 

“Yes, that about sums it up.” 

“Kravitz, please.” 

“In my defence, ma’am, they were throwing fireballs.” 

“Kravitz, that's worse. You let four aliens who can throw fire escape. It was bad enough before I knew they had superpowers.” 

“Well, I meant that it was pretty hard to arrest four magic aliens.” 

She sighs heavily and pinches the bridge of her nose – she's definitely got a migraine coming on – before looking up at him. “Okay, Kravitz, fine. What’s your next move?” 

“Uh.” 

“You were only reporting back so you could ask me what to do.” She says. It’s phrased like a question, but her tone makes it obvious she knows. 

Kravitz gives a wry smile. “That is the benefit of having a boss, ma’am.” 

“Okay. Get them in here.” 

Angus is fascinated. He’s never been in a secret government facility before. It’s an office building, fifty floors high, and from the outside it looks entirely ordinary. On the inside, he’ll admit, it looks like a pretty standard office, too, but he’s sure that somewhere nearby there’s, like, a bunch of alien tech, or something. 

Barry doesn’t seem so hyped. He’s sweating profusely, and he keeps standing up to pace the floor before slumping back in his chair again. 

He’s just stood up from his chair when Kravitz opens the door to the Director’s office again, and holds it ajar. “Come in, guys.” 

Barry lets out a wheeze that could be an affirmative, but Kravitz has already vanished back inside. Angus jumps up, excitably, and heads in. 

The Director stands, holding a cane carved of some exotic wood. She’s a black woman, Angus places her in her mid-fifties, with silver hair. There are twelve portraits on the walls, all old white men, staring down at them disapprovingly, each with a name plate and years embossed on a plaque underneath. The walls themselves are wood-panelled, and the furniture is modern but plush. Kravitz is sat on a chair opposite the Director’s desk, so Angus walks up and takes the seat next to him. Barry bows. 

The Director looks like she was about to launch into a speech, but she stares at Barry instead. Kravitz simply places his head in his hands. Barry flushes and takes the seat, looking like he wishes he was just about anywhere else. 

“This is the guy who deceived you so effectively?” The Director asks Kravitz, who only groans into his hands. 

“I’m sorry,” Barry says. “I really don’t know why I did that.” 

“Let’s gloss over it, shall we?” She says. “I’ll just get on with the speech I was going to give. Uh. You really threw me off.” 

He looks miserable. “I’m not good with authority figures.” 

“Right. Okay. Anyway.” She shakes her head like she’s trying to erase the image of him bowing from her mind like an etch a sketch. “Welcome to the Bureau. We’re a top-secret organisation dedicated to the concealment of the existence of aliens from the general public.” 

Barry nervously puts his hand up. Angus tries to tug his sleeve to make him put it down again, but the Director stops and sighs. “Yes, Barry?” 

“Uh, why?” 

“You’re being weird about it and you’ve had, like, eight weeks to calm down. That’s why. People can’t be trusted to act rationally. We’ve never had a live alien come to earth before, anyway, only ancient artefacts.” She blinks, and it seems like she’s back on track. “The first artefact to fall to earth was what we’ve termed the Phoenix Fire Gauntlet, in the early fifties. It levelled a small town, and President Truman decided that such power was dangerous. Especially because we didn’t understand it.” 

Angus nods eagerly, trying to show that at least one of them understands what she’s getting at. 

“Since, we’ve had dozens of alien artefacts fall to earth, each with different capabilities. Some of them we don’t even know what they do.” She frowns. “They’re all, almost to a one, dangerous. So, we catalogue them and lock them away in the Eternal Archive.” 

Barry puts his hand up again, and the Director nods. “Well, uh, excuse me, ma’am, but what do you plan to do with Taako and Lup? They’re - they’re pretty much refugees, as far as I can tell.” 

“Taako and Lup are the twins? The good twins?” Barry nods. “Well, that is a quandary.” 

“Ma’am, they’re, like, real chill. I promise. Ango, tell ‘em.” 

Angus nods. “They’re pretty chill. Taako made Kravitz pottery.” 

The Director blinks, and turns to Kravitz, who shoots a betrayed look at Angus.

“Wha - uh, I mean – he made me a plate. I think it was a joke, because it’s tiny.” Kravitz pulls the plate Taako made at the chug’n’squeeze out of his pocket. The diameter is about the same size as his pinky. It’s not perfectly round, and it’s painted in shades of sickly yellow and green. 

“You said you liked it,” Angus says, raising an eyebrow. 

“Well, of course, he tentacled me before, so I wasn’t going to say it was ugly, was I?” Kravitz says, looking flustered. 

The Director whaps her cane onto the desk in front of them. “Kravitz, please. I’m begging you to stop.” 

He nods, sits up straighter, and tucks the plate back in his pocket. “Sorry, ma’am.” 

“Okay. Good. Uh. Right. You’re willing to vouch for them, Kravitz?” 

“Yes, ma’am,” he says. 

“Okay, then we’ll find them. Any idea where they went?” 

“Uh, they might have taken my car,” Barry says. “It wasn’t in the parking lot when we left the mall.” 

Kravitz stares at him. “You didn’t volunteer this before?” 

“Well, in my defence, I thought you were arresting me, so I kinda wanted Lup to escape. We drove here in your car, it wasn’t like I needed it.” 

“Can Lup drive?” Angus says. “I don’t see how Taako could’ve learned.” 

Barry winces. “No. I really hope she doesn’t crash it.” 

Lup looks over her shoulder, and doesn’t see Edward and Lydia. She wiggles the hairpin in the lock once more, and Barry’s car pops open. “ Fuck yeah, Koko, I got it. ” She slides in and pops the passenger door open.  Taako  hops in next to her. She looks at the wheel, the buttons and dials, the pedals. “Hmm .” 

He cocks his head. “Lulu, have you – you've driven one of these before, right?” She looks at him. He cringes. “Oh, no.” 

“Hey, how hard can it be? I drove a spaceship.”  

“Lup, you crashed that. Into a planet.”  

“Details, details. Anyway, this doesn’t even go up and down, just left and right. That’s, like, half as many directions, therefore, twice as easy.”  She presses the button marked “START” and pushes the lever into “DRIVE.” The engine roars to life. Now, which of these pedals is go? 

She puts her foot down on one at random and the car lunges forward. The twins let out identical shrieks and Taako covers his eyes. 

Chapter Text

Lup yanks on the wheel, and  Taako  lurches against his seatbelt. She just rolls her eyes. “Drama queen.”   

“Lulu, I’m  begging  you to put autopilot on.” He opens his eyes and sees the Court from the window. It’s vast, all gunmetal and chrome, glass and steel, and watching it slip overhead and off the viewscreen makes him feel quite queasy so he closes his eyes again.  

“You think I’ve got any idea which button does that?”  

“You said you’d read the manual!”  

“Skimmed. I said I’d skimmed the manual.” She turns again, more gently this time, and the Pod turns in a softer arc. “Better?”  

He’s clutching his armrests, knuckles white, eyes squeezed shut. “Do these come with vomit bags?”  

She barely listens, instead pushing the yoke gently backwards and grinning as the engine growls, the acceleration pushing them both back in their seats in a burst of speed. “C’mon, Ko, lighten up.  Wanna  see how fast this baby can go?”  

“No,” he says, his voice sounding strained. “Not even a little bit.”  

She grins and floors it. The Pod pulses with power and roars forward, and  Lup  whoops with glee.  Taako  moans.  

“Okay, Chief  Navigator , which way?” She says, over the roar.  Taako  doesn’t answer. He doesn’t even open his eyes, so she eases off and slows down. “Hey, Mr. Chekov, I’m relying on you here.”  

“You’re not Kirk,”  Taako  says, finally opening his eyes to glare at her. “We talked about this.”  

“I’m more of a Kirk than you,” she grins. “You think Kirk would be hollering like that?”  

“I - I never hollered!” He protests.  

She makes a show of rolling her eyes. “Sure.  Wanna  tell me where Earth is?”  

“Lulu, it’s all the same -”  

“Captain  Lup .”  

“What?”  

“It’s captain  Lup  to you,” she says.  

“Well, hold on, Kirk didn’t fly the ship,”  Taako  shoots back. “That makes you Sulu.”  

She frowns at him. “How do you even know this? I distinctly remember you saying Star Trek was for nerds.”  

He glowers. “Shut the fuck up. Anyway, as I was saying, it all looks the same out there. I don’t know which way we’re fucking going. It's not like I can just look at a map.”  

She pauses and pulls a face. “Huh. Yeah. That’s a good point.”  

“Doesn’t the computer tell you which way to go or something?”  

“Yeah, probably, but I’d have to work out how to use the ding dang thing.”  

Taako  looks at her nervously. “ Lup , it’s occurring to me that you don’t know how to use most of the functions of this ship – how do you intend to land it?”  

“Honestly, Ko, I was hoping you’d read that section of the manual out to me as I do it,” she says.  Taako  looks even paler than he had a moment ago, if that’s possible. “How hard can it be? It’ll probably be, like, two buttons. I’ll just drive around ‘til we see Earth. We’ll be fine.”  

“ Told you we’d be fine,”  she says, pushing the brake pedal a little too hard. They both jerk forwards in their seats. “ Shit, I jinxed it.”  

Taako  fumbles the door handle in his desperation to get out, but finally manages it. He takes a few big steps away from the car and takes a deep breath. “ Why do I always let you drive?”  

“Because I’m good at it.”  

“You’re good at giving me high blood pressure,”  he grumbles.  

Lup  shrugs his comment off. She’s pretty proud of herself – Barry's car is only slightly dinged up, and the twins are both fine, so she considers it an absolute win, even if she hasn’t  quite  managed to get the car within the lines of the parking space. Okay, it’s not even remotely within the lines, but it’s her first time, fuck off.  “ C’mon, Ko, they’re probably waiting for us.”  

They head back into the motel. There’s a different receptionist at the desk, this time – an absolutely enormous orcish woman – and she looks up and waves as the pair enters.  Lup  smiles and waves back, but hurries off before this very muscular woman tries to make conversation in a language they don’t understand.  

She knocks on the door of their room. “ Don’t embarrass me in front of Barry,”  she scowls at  Taako , while they wait. “ He thinks I’m cool, I don’t want him knowing what a goofus my brother is.”  

“He thinks  you’re  cool? He’s about to be blown away,”  he says, adjusting his hat.  

The door opens and a dragonborn lady steps out. “ This is Barry?”  Taako  asks, with a lopsided grin.  

Lup  looks at the number on the door. She was sure this had been their room. She starts trying to assemble the words in Common to  apologise  and drag  Taako  away, but she  realises  the lady is looking them up and down with one eyebrow raised. “ So, you’re the magic aliens?”  She asks.  

Both twins are instantly bristling for a fight.  Lup’s  hands come up, balled into fists, and  Taako  raises his palms in a casting stance.  

Then the enormous receptionist coughs behind them, and they both turn to look at her rippling muscles. “ I wouldn’t start anything you can’t finish,”  she says. “ Anyway, we come in peace, and all that. We’re with Kravitz. Come on inside.”  

Taako  starts mumbling belligerently that he could totally take the enormous orc – not loud enough that she’d hear, of course, but the dragonborn notices and covers a grin – as both twins head inside.  

Lup’s  still ready for a fight. She’s not entirely sure she trusts Kravitz, for a start, and so she definitely doesn’t trust these two. But, as they enter,  Taako  is almost immediately bowled over by Angus colliding with him in a hug, and she grins at him with an eyebrow raised as he pats the kid on the head a little awkwardly. “ Okay, kid, c’mon. Get off. You’re embarrassing me in front of all these people.”  

Kravitz and Barry are stood at the back of the room, flanking a lady with white hair and a cane. Barry shoots a wave and a nervous grin. Kravitz nods at  Taako , and looks as if he’s going to say something, but the lady stands up and gestures to the women stood behind the twins. The dragonborn lady locks the door, and the orcish lady flexes deliberately at  Lup , and it’s probably meant to be threatening, but jeez, if she wasn’t already kind of with  Barry  she’d probably be making a pass at that.  

Is she with Barry? Huh. They hadn’t really discussed that. She thinks so. All the making out would definitely imply something to that effect.  

The lady with grey hair taps her cane on the floor and  Taako  looks up from his conversation with Angus and  Lup  stops drooling over the musclebound orc. “ Welcome, the two of you,”  she says, but then pulls a face. “ Uh, welcome to your own hotel room, I guess. That had less gravitas than I was hoping.”  

Lup grins. She likes this lady already.  

“ My name is Lucretia. I’m the director of the Bureau, an organisation dedicated to preventing aliens from appearing in the public eye.”  

Lup  winces. This lady probably doesn’t like her too much.  

“ We exist precisely to prevent battles like yours occurring. People could have died,”  she continues. “ That said, I understand that this was not your fault, and it seems like you were aiming to prevent a confrontation. I’d very much like to hear your perspective on this, but first, please put these on.”  

She holds out a hand, showing two tiny earbuds. Both twins hesitate, and so the Director lifts her own hair off her ear to show that she’s also wearing one. “ It’s a translation device. Please, this will make things easier for everyone.”  Lup  nods, and grabs one, placing it in her ear, and  Taako  follows suit, noticeably less eagerly. There’s a soft whine from the device, and then the Director says, in common, “thank you.” The device translates almost immediately, whispering the elvish in her ear, and  Lup  nods again.  

“You’re welcome,” she says, in elvish, and this time she notices that the Director listens to her earbud for a second before nodding.  

The Director gestures to Kravitz. “This is Agent Kravitz, whom you both already know. Behind you are Carey and Killian.” The two  nod  in confirmation. “Unfortunately, we have very little time for pleasantries. As I understand it, those two are still out there somewhere, yes?”  

It’s  Taako  who speaks up this time. “Yeah, but you guys have, like, guns, right? Problem  solved,  we can all go home.”  

“I’d really prefer to avoid killing anyone, if possible. Especially if, as I understand it, these two are some kind of police force. Lethal force would likely complicate relations with your kind, and we’d like to avoid that,” the Director frowns. “We need information, though. Who are they? Why are they chasing you?”  

“Yeah,”  Lup  says. “Okay, starting from the beginning, which is, like, five thousand years ago, there were elves who didn’t like humans or dwarves or orcs or whoever founding cities or mines or whatever on their territory. None of that racist shit, they were just super reclusive, wanted to be left alone. Wars were fought over it, until one day everyone just stopped.”  

Lucretia cocks her head. “Yes, this is recorded in our history. How did you know that? And what’s the relevance?”  

“Did you ever wonder why everyone chilled out? Like, overnight, the elvish armies just stopped fighting,”  Lup  continues. “It’s because the worst, most reclusive elves decided to leave.”  

“They used magic to summon a craft capable of spaceflight,”  Taako  says. “We don’t know how. Whatever they used has been lost in the last five millennia.”  

Lup  nods. “The Court. It’s an enormous spaceship, and it orbits around the distant regions of this solar system. It’s home to, like, two billion elves.” She can see the Director’s eyes widen at that, and she gets it. It’s a lotta elves.  

“Christ,” Killian mutters, and, looking around the room, it’s pretty clear the other earthlings agree with the sentiment. They’ve all gone decidedly pale.  

“Most of them are probably cool,”  Taako  says. “It’s just the leaders are  real  shitty. They’re super into, like, order. There’s a lotta laws, regulations, all that junk. We weren’t on board, so  Lup  stole a ship and we left.”  

The Director nods, slowly. “Okay. This is first contact, technically, so we should probably try and establish diplomatic relations. Those other elves must have a way of contacting the Court, right?”  

Lup  and  Taako  look at each other nervously.  

“Uh, not  gonna  lie, I don’t think that’s a good idea,”  Taako  says, slowly.  

“They won’t negotiate if they think you’re weak,”  Lup  continues. “They’ll demand you turn us over, which, by the way, I’m not a fan of  that  idea, and then they’ll probably want all the technology you took. Like, our ship, that stuff. If you refuse, they’d probably invade. But, if you agree, they’ll think they can walk all over you, and they’ll probably demand other shit, too. And you’ve got some of their tech, so you know how advanced they are.”  

Lucretia has gone well and truly pale. She licks her lips, nervously, and says, “Obviously that’s not the optimal scenario. So, what do you suggest?”  

Chapter Text

“I feel like an idiot,” Lup says. Taako gives her a shit-eating grin, but she cuts him off before he can say anything. “Shut up. You know what I mean.” 

“Well, we don’t know how they found us, except that we were in public. This makes sense.” 

“Doesn’t make it feel less stupid.” 

The twins are stood in Neverwinter’s town centre, just milling around. There’s a market on, and so they’re wandering from stall to stall, making sure that they stand out. Lup’s wearing the bright red jacket she’d picked up in the store, and Taako’s got on his wizard’s hat. “If you want something to distract you, we could talk about the heart eyes Barold was shooting at you,” Taako says, as Lup reads the title off the spine of a sci-fi book. 

“No, actually, let’s go back to wandering around in silence,” she says, and Taako laughs, before he looks up and looks into the nearby coffee shop’s window and winks. “Although, we could talk about your boy. He’s pretty handsome.” 

Taako tears his eyes away from where Kravitz is sat, trying to maintain a low profile, and examines his perfect fingernails. “Really? Hadn’t noticed.” 

She scoffs, and shoots Carey a subtle thumbs up as they walk past her. She’s sat on a park bench, pretending to read a newspaper. “Yeah, right, Ko. And what’s up with you and Ango? You’ll be filling out adoption papers within a month if you keep this up.” 

“Okay, sure, but you lived in Barry’s house for a month and a half and you didn’t ask the dude out? You’re  so  into him, Lulu.” She doesn’t reply, and he cocks his head and grins. “Oh my gods. You totally did ask him out. Lup, are you dating Barry Bluejeans?” 

She mumbles something, and he cups a hand round his ear. “Pardon, sister dear?” 

“I said that’s not his name.” 

Taako cackles at her lack of a denial. “I can’t believe you got on my ass about Krav, and you’re dating Barold!” 

“We’re not dating!” She protests. “I - I don’t know what we are. I don’t even know if they date on this planet. What if they do some weird ritual? What if they’re still really big on courtship, and I have to be respectful and all that shit and get his parents’ blessing?” 

Taako grins at her, but Lup sticks her tongue out, so Taako grabs it and pulls. She squawks and bats at him. He lets go, and as they walk past a market stall, Lup grabs an apple and takes a bite. Killian, dressed in a red and white striped apron and a grocer’s hat, working behind the stall, rolls her eyes at her, but otherwise gives no indication she recognises them. 

“You’re not dating, but you slept in a hotel room together. Now, Lulu, maths may not be my strong suit,” he grins, “but I can count to one, and there was only one bed in that room.” 

She chucks her apple at his head, but Taako waves a hand and it floats away instead. She scowls at him, and he sticks his tongue out. “I hope Edward and Lydia show up, just so we can stop talking about this.” 

“Speaking of, this isn’t working. We’ve been out here for, like, twenty minutes.” 

“You’re so impatient.” 

“No, Lu, they found us in like twenty seconds before. Remember? You tackled Kravitz, and they were there within two minutes.” 

Lup pulls a face. As much as she hates to admit it, Taako’s completely right. “Okay, so what do we do?” 

“What we do best,” he replies. “We make a scene.” 

Lup scans the town centre. It’s about an hour after sunset, and it’s quiet. There are a few people about, and Lup feels bad for what they’re about to do. 

Lucretia had fucking hated this idea. It’d been almost comical to see her reaction - “what part of ‘we want to stop aliens from appearing in public’ did you misunderstand?” - but she’d eventually agreed to the logic. This was the only way. 

Taako steps forward, clicks his fingers, and sends a fireball into the sky. 

The few people stood around him gasp. Some shy away, but others seem to think it’s a trick of some kind. One man claps. Lup steps forward and hurls a fireball in his direction, aiming to miss by a mile but still feeling terrible. 

The applause stops, and the people scatter. 

But then Edward and Lydia appear out of thin air. 

It’s like a time lapse video of them being drawn into existence by some demonic artist. Their outlines appear first, out of the shadows, and the colour slowly fades in. The last things to appear are their matching evil grins. 

“Did you think we wouldn’t notice?” Lydia asks. “You’re using magic in public? Tut, tut. I can’t imagine your new friends are very happy.” 

“Or is this a trap?” Edward grins predatorially. “You thought you could lure us in, and what? Kill us? The Court would only send more agents. This quaint little planet would be overrun.” 

“Come on, now. We got off on the wrong foot, before. I understand that. But this is for the good of your friends. We’re a lighter touch than some of the others, trust me.” 

“Come with us, and we’ll leave this planet alone. They have nothing we want.” 

“Refuse, and we’ll level every city on this disgusting rock.” 

Lup’s hands ignite in flame. Taako adjusts his hat and scowls. 

Lydia grins. “Do you know what? I rather hoped that would be your reaction.” 

She steps forward, her own hands crackling with energy, and she looses a bolt of lightning, but it crackles off an invisible wall, just feet from Taako. The grin fades and she cocks her head, firing another beam of energy. It just – stops, in mid-air. Taako doesn’t even flinch. 

“Counter-offer,” Lup says. “You surrender, and we don’t return you to the court in chains. We’ll let you keep your dignity.” 

Edward laughs. “Tempting, tempting, but I think we’ll refuse.” He hurls a fireball, and the flames lick off the barrier. His laugh immediately turns into a snarl, and he steps forward to investigate. 

Then, a ray of red light fires from the shadows and strikes Edward in the chest. He falls backwards with a howl, and collapses. Killian steps forward, wielding an enormous crossbow. Runes are carved into the wood, and they glow as she reloads. 

Carey steps into the square from the other side, her gun trained on Lydia. Kravitz appears from behind the elves, and he’s brandishing a pistol too. He winks at Taako, and Taako grins. 

“You’re just a little outnumbered,” he says to Lydia. 

Lucretia walks into the square from behind Taako and Lup, her cane glowing with the light of a blue rune carved into the top. She presses it, and the invisible wall in front of the twins vanishes with a puff. “Surrender,” Lucretia says. “You can’t win. We’re using your own technology, your own magic against you. There’s six of us, and two of you. Give it up.” 

But Edward only grins. He slowly stands up, still obviously in pain from Killian’s shot, and holds out his hand. A bell of black metal, painted with blood-red runs around the mouth, appears in it. He rings it once, and disappears. Lydia laughs and claps her hands. 

Killian fires another shot with the crossbow, but as Lydia’s hands touch each other, she fades away just as quickly as she’d appeared. Killian’s beam of red light punctures right through the space Lydia had just occupied, leaving just the sound of her delighted, evil laughter ringing around the square. 

“What the fuck was that?” Lucretia asks. 

Barry’s even more anxious than usual. He’d been left babysitting while Lup goes off to fight, and, like, he gets it, because he’s got absolutely no combat skills, but that doesn’t stop him worrying. 

He looks over at Angus, who’s asleep, with his tiny deerstalker hat pulled down over his eyes, and pulls the kid’s blanket up so it’s covering him better. Barry wishes he could get some sleep. At least then he wouldn’t just be pacing, waiting for them to get back. 

At least the Director had consented to them actually being on-site. Barry had worried she’d try to send him home, and then he might never see Lup again. Instead, they’re sat in the back of an unmarked white van in the town square’s parking lot, and he still might never see Lup again. 

Suddenly, the van feels tiny, and Barry feels like there’s no oxygen in the room. Gods, what if she dies? He hadn’t even got to say goodbye; planning this operation had been so hectic that he’d barely said anything to her since that morning, before Edward and Lydia had attacked them in the mall. That felt like a lifetime ago. 

God, he needs some air. 

He unlocks the back of the van and steps out, taking a deep breath in the cold night air and running a hand through his hair. But then, he catches movement from the corner of his eye. Fuck. What was that? 

He spins, but there’s nothing there, and for a split second he relaxes, but there’s a cruel laugh from his other side, so he spins back around again. Another laugh, this time from behind him. Shit. It has to be the elves. 

Barry debates running, but Angus is in the van. He has to protect the kid. Even as his blood runs cold in his veins, he balls his fists and shouts, “come on out!” 

Edward steps out of the shadows and grins. He’s holding a bell cast of black metal, with intricate runes woven around the mouth. “Hi, Barry,”  he says. “Nice to see you again.”  

“I wish I could say the same,”  Barry replies. “Get the fuck out of here. Lup’ll be here any second. Although, if you wanna stick around, I’m sure she can fuck your nose up even more.”  

Edward grits his teeth, his hand automatically flying to his crooked nose. “My nose will heal. What I’m about to do to you won’t.”  

And he rings the bell. 

Chapter Text

“You don’t know what that bell was?” Killian asks. 

“No, I – I didn’t get a good look at the runes,” Lup says. “I don’t know.” 

“They didn’t leave together,” Taako says. “Why did they both teleport away separately?” 

Lucretia frowns. “Are they both going to different places? Where?” 

Kravitz inhales sharply. “Fuck. What about Angus and Barry? Someone ring them.” 

There’s a heavy silence as Lucretia dials Barry’s number. It rings. 

Lup starts running after the third ring. It’s taking too long. Taako’s after her like a shot, and Kravitz follows Taako. Killian and Carey wait with Lucretia as the phone continues to ring. 

“Hi, you’ve reached the voicemail of Barry Hallwinter,” Barry’s voice says. “Please leave a message.” 

There’s a beep, and Killian, Carey and Lucretia start running too. 

Lup’s lungs are burning as she sprints full-pelt towards the truck. It looks fine; parked exactly where they left it, the doors still closed, the lights off. But that just makes her more worried about what the inside will look like. 

Gods, if Barry’s dead, she’ll - 

She finally reaches the truck, and pounds on the back door to be let in. There’s no reply. Fire ignites in her hand, and she hurls it at the truck. The doors explode, rippling in their frame, only barely staying on their hinges, the locks snapping, and Lup rips them open. 

Everything’s fine. Barry blinks, blearily, at her. Angus stirs in his sleep, but somehow doesn’t wake. 

Lup throws herself at Barry, wrapping him up in a hug. “Jesus, Bear, I was worried,” she says, but he laughs. 

“About what? Everything’s fine, Lup, what’s going on?” 

“Why didn’t you answer your phone, you dick?” She slaps him on the arm and he grimaces. 

“Sorry, I – I was asleep? I didn’t hear it ring.” He looks at her panicked face. “What happened?” 

“Edward and Lydia escaped. I thought -” she shakes her head, unable to finish the sentence. 

“No, no, Lup, I haven’t seen them. It's fine.” 

Taako and Kravitz appear in the doorway and look in. Taako looks immediately relieved at the lack of blood and gore everywhere, and Kravitz turns away to ring the Director. 

“So what’s the plan now?” Barry asks. “Are we – we're going to look for them?” 

Kravitz reappears in the doorway. “I don’t think the Director is too pleased that you didn’t answer your phone, but she’s happy you’re not dead. She’s on the way.” 

Barry chuckles. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you guys.” 

“It’s fine, Barry, it’s okay. I’m just glad you’re not dead.” 

“Yeah, I mean, me too,” Barry laughs. It’s an odd sound, slightly different from his usual nervous but happy laughter in a way Lup can’t put her finger on. The hair rises on the back of her neck, but she can’t even begin to explain why. 

The Director arrives before Lup can quiz Barry on what’s going on, and she immediately says, “what were you thinking? What if we’d needed immediate contact with you? You need to keep your phone on at all times.” 

Barry grits his teeth angrily, but only for a split second. It's such a short space of time that Lup’s not even sure she didn’t imagine it. “Of course, ma’am,” he says, with an easy grin. 

“Okay, fine,” the Director sighs. “There’s not a lot we can do now. They escaped, and now they know it’s a trap. I’m going to assign you a protective detail.” She pulls a face. “Sorry, but I think it’s best if you all stay at Barry’s house. I hate to say you’re bait, but we do still need to catch them, and they know where Barry lives. If you’re not okay with that, we can assign you living space -” 

“No sweat, madam D,” Taako says. “Me ‘n’ Lup can handle being bait. Right, Lulu?” 

The Director hums doubtfully. “I wouldn’t ask if there was any other way. I’m sorry. Barry, is that okay?” 

“Absolutely,” Barry smiles. “No problems here.” 

Again, Lup gets the niggling feeling that something’s wrong, but she can’t put her finger on it. 

Killian and Carey get in the front of the truck with the Director, and Kravitz stays in the back with the others. Lup tries to shut the doors, but they’re ill-fitting after her fireball-tossing, and so she has to cable-tie the handles together. Angus, somehow, stays asleep. Lup smiles. The kid’s gonna be furious he missed all this. 

The engine roars to life and the van pulls away. 

Barry’s house is exactly as Lup remembers it, but dark and still. Taako’s never seen the place before, and he immediately starts poking around. 

Kravitz walks in behind, Angus asleep in his arms, and closes the door behind him. 

“Okay, we’ve got teams outside. Nothing can get in here without us knowing.” 

“What about in here?” Barry speaks up. It’s been some time since he last said anything, and Lup had been working on the assumption that he’d been freaked out after the day’s events. She’s looking forward to having a real conversation with him. “How do we let them know if something happens?” 

“I’ve got a phone,” Kravitz says, reassuringly. “It’s fine. Now, Barry, have you got anywhere I can let Angus sleep?” 

“Yeah,” Barry says, opening the door to the kitchen, before closing it again. “Not that way,” he says, and chuckles, turning to the other door and showing Kravitz through into the living room. 

Kravitz lays Angus down gently on the couch, and Taako twirls his fingers to conjure a blanket to lay over the kid. He leans over to tuck him in. 

As much as Lup wants to tease Taako for that show of domesticity, she’s got bigger things on her mind. “Hey, Barry, can we go talk?” She tugs at his sleeve. 

He blinks at her. “Yeah, sure.” 

She leads him out into the kitchen, flipping the light switch on. Someone – Lup assumes the Bureau’s investigators – has packed away all the shopping they'd been forced to abandon when they’d run from Edward and Lydia. Barry hops up to sit on the counter, and Lup stands next to him. 

“How are you feeling?” She asks him. 

She knows that she’s dumped a lot on him before now. He’d barely blinked at her being an alien, jumping right into taking care of her; he’d hardly panicked about being hunted by evil magic cops. But, somehow it seems unfair to expect him to deal with all this shit. There’s a secret government agency camped around his house! Lup suspects he’s got a lot going on right now. 

“Eh, pretty good,” he shrugs. 

Lup blinks. Okay. 

“You - you’re not freaking out? My brother and his totally-boyfriend are next door with the child they’ve adopted, and there’s secret agents outside, and magic aliens hunting us.” 

Barry shrugs. “Y’know, Lup, I was thinking. Maybe it’d be best if you just turned yourself in, right?” 

Lup’s eyes widen in shock and she steps back. “What?” 

“Well, listen. They’re, like, totally gonna kick our asses. I mean, they’re magic, what can we do against that, right? And, y’know, they did say they’d be lenient if you handed yourself over.” 

Lup’s not even sure what to say to that. “Barry, I – I’d never see you again. Even if they didn’t kill us.” 

“Yeah, but sacrifices have to be made, right?” He jumps down from the counter and stands next to her. Even though he’s shorter than her, it somehow feels like he’s looming over her threateningly. “And Edward and Lydia will probably kill us all if you don’t.” 

At that moment, before Lup can even process a reply, the cat flap opens, and Sildar steps through. 

“Oh, shit, Sildar!” Lup says, stepping back to give the cat some space – he's still not too fond of her. “Gods, I totally forgot about him -” She looks at Barry, and his eyes are wide, pupils dilated. His face is a mask of terror. “Barry?” 

He takes a step back. The fur on Sildar’s neck starts to stand on end, and he slinks forward, low to the ground. His eyes are fixed on Barry. 

The cat hisses, and Barry steps back again. 

Lup looks at the cat, and then back at Barry. 

“Barry,” she says, quietly. “How did you know that Edward and Lydia said they’d be lenient if we surrendered? You weren’t there either time we fought.” 

Barry doesn’t break eye contact with the cat, but he scowls. “You’re too damn smart for your own good.” 

And he snaps his fingers. 

A wave of force ripples out from his hand, and Lup is hurled backwards. Sildar yowls and disappears back through the cat flap as Lup smacks her head on Barry’s fridge and slumps to the ground, the world spinning around her. 

Fuck.  

She blinks, trying to force the world to settle down around her, but it refuses. She staggers to her feet, feeling as if she’s taken half a dozen shots of straight vodka, and watches as Barry heads into the living room. 

“Hey, guys,” he says with a grin in his voice, and Lup stumbles towards the door. 

By the time she gets there, Barry’s sat on the couch, his feet up on the coffee table. Kravitz’s hand is on his gun. Taako’s are wreathed in flame, but both of them are frozen. 

“Oh, damn,” Barry says as Lup staggers in, grabbing the doorframe. “I really thought I’d hit you hard enough to knock you out. No matter.” He reaches over and pats Angus’ head. “If you even think about drawing the gun, I’ll kill the kid before it’s even out of its holster.” 

Taako gives a tiny gasp. 

“Edward.” Kravitz says. 

Barry gives a cruel grin. “Yeah. No shit.” 

“What do you want?” Taako says. 

“Same thing I’ve wanted this whole time. I want you and you,” he points at the twins, “to come back to the Court. Only this time, you’re going to do it. If you don’t, I’ll kill this body. Are you willing to sacrifice Barry?” 

There’s silence for a beat. 

“No,” Taako says, with a glance at Lup. “We’ll come with you. Let Barry go.” 

Edward snarls. “You do  not  give orders. Get on your knees.” 

Taako grits his teeth, but slowly drops to his knees. Edward grins. “Ah, that’s better. Now, say another word and I’ll kill everyone in this room and make you watch.” 

He pauses for a second, watching their stony faces. “Ah, c’mon, Kravitz. You should be happy at least! Your world gets to live!” 

There’s more silence. “Fine, you can talk. Dramatic monologuing is no fun without witty repartee.” 

“We’ll come with you,” Lup says. “Let’s go. Now.” 

“Oh, please. You think I’m stupid?” Edward looks up and at Lup. “There are two dozen agents outside that door. We’re not going anywhere. Not yet. We're waiting until -” 

Suddenly, the lump under the blanket that is Angus twists, and the blanket goes flying and wraps around Edward’s face. For a split second, he’s left blind, and Angus jumps up off the couch, and in an instant Kravitz’s gun is in his hand. “Don’t move,” he says. 

But Edward only smiles, throwing the blanket aside. “Sneaky,” he says. “How long have you been awake, kid?” 

Angus huddles into Taako’s side, not looking at Edward. Taako puts a comforting hand on his head. 

“Okay,” Edward says. “Fine. You’ve got me. But will you shoot me? This is Barry’s body, after all. You’d be killing him.” 

“We don’t know that,” Kravitz says. “This might be an illusion, not a possession. Killing you might leave Barry totally unharmed.” 

“It might,” Edward shrugs. “Try it.” 

Kravitz grits his teeth and adjusts his grip on his gun. 

“Wait! We don’t need to kill him,” Lup says, pleadingly. “We - we can take him alive. We can get the agents outside in -” 

“I’ll kill Barry before you can take me in,” Edward supplies. “Just to complicate matters for you.” 

“Lup,” Kravitz says. “Leave. You don’t want to see this.” 

“No! You can’t -”  

Edward laughs, but there’s a trace of anxiety on his face. “You’re actually going to kill Barry?” 

“If I have to,” Kravitz says. “Lup, go.” 

Lup snarls. “No! I won’t let you kill him -” 

“Lup,” he says again, and this time there’s a weird tone to his voice. Lup pauses. “Take Angus and go.” 

Okay, so Kravitz has a plan. But what is it? What does he want her to do – oh. 

Lup gulps, looking away from Edward/Barry. “Hey, Ango, let’s go.” 

“Ma’am -” 

“Go,” Taako whispers, and Angus lets go of his hand and nods tearfully. 

Lup leads Angus out of the kitchen door. “Don’t move,” she whispers, and sneaks around, through the kitchen into the hall. She stands at the door between the hall and the living room and waits, listening intently. 

“You’re really going to shoot Barry?” Edward says, and the nerves in his voice are obvious now. “You’re going to kill Lup’s beau?” 

“It doesn’t have to be fatal,” Kravitz says, grimly. “I can incapacitate you.” 

Edward laughs. “Oh, it’ll be fatal. I’ll end his life before you can do anything to stop me.” 

“You fucker,” Taako says. “You sick, sick -” 

“Oh, please, I’m just doing my job. You’re the one who endangered this world. If you hadn’t left the Court, none of this would be happening,” Edward says. 

Lup slides the door open a tiny bit, and watches Edward through the crack. He’s leaning forward, looking at Taako. She takes one deep breath, then another. Her hands crackle with magic and - 

She leaps into the room, her hands sparking with barely contained magic, and Edward’s turning, his own hands coming up in a defensive posture, but he’s far too late, and her hands are clamped around Barry’s –  Edward's –  skull. 

He yells, and jerks, his limbs flailing and his eyes rolling back, and Lup doesn’t let go, despite the tears in her eyes and the breath catching in her throat. She keeps channelling that electricity into him until he drops, limp, in her arms. 

“Barry?” She whispers. “Barry?” She cradles him, brushing his hair from his face. “Barry, please, please -” 

He doesn’t move. He barely breathes. 

Chapter Text

Fuck,  is Barry’s first thought upon regaining consciousness. His second thought is,  ow,  and his third thought is really kind of a reprise of the first one.  Fuck.  

His fourth thought is a lot better, though, because he opens his eyes and sees Lup, sat in an armchair by his bedside. “Oh,” he says. “Hi.”  

She looks up at him, and it’s obvious she’s been crying; her eyes are red, her makeup smeared, but she smiles regardless. “Hey, Bear. How are you feeling?”  

“Uh,  kinda  like I got struck by  lightning ?”  

She winces, looking guilty. “That’s honestly not too far off.”  

He looks around, and finds that he’s in a hospital bed, an IV in his arm. There’s a single window, but the curtains are pulled closed.  

“What’s the last thing you remember?” She asks.  

“Uh, I was with Angus in the parking lot?” He says. “I - I got up, and – oh.” She stands up from her chair and steps closer to him, starting to hold out her hands as if to hug him before stopping and stepping back, wringing her hands. He furrows his brow. “What happened?”  

“Edward,” she says, her voice small. “He possessed you, somehow. We don’t know. The Bureau’s looking at the bell he used. They call it the Animus Bell.”  

“Lup, that’s not what I mean. What happened to you? Did – god, did I hurt you?” She looks away, but he hears her sniffle. “Lup, fuck, I’m sorry.”  

“No, Bear, no. It wasn’t - even if you had hurt me, it wasn’t you,” she says. “I - had to electrocute you. To stun you. It – it worked, he’s gone, Kravitz arrested him, but -”  

She wipes at her eyes, and he steps in. “So,  Lup , it all worked out. You – you did what you had to do.  Lup , I’d much rather have got a little shock than let him hurt you.” He pauses, and opens his arms out wide. “ C’mere . Come on.”  

She leans down, and buries her face in his neck. He wraps his arms around her, rubbing circles on her back. “It’s okay,  Lup , it’s okay.”  

She pulls back from him, and he shuffles over in the bed, careful not to knock his IV. “I could do with a cuddle,” he says, patting the bed beside him, and she laughs, wetly.  

“Babe, how would that even work? I’d have to climb up -”  

“ Lup , you’re magic. If anyone can do it, you can.”  

She chuckles, wiping at her eyes one more time, before waving her hand and floating into the air, manipulating herself so she lands perfectly on the bed next to him, wrapping one arm around his chest. He’s suddenly a little self-conscious about the hospital gown he’s wearing, but Lup’s seen him in less.  

“I - I was so worried,” she murmurs, her body pressed tight to his.  

“It’s okay now,” he whispers back. “We’re okay.”  

There’s  a few beats of silence. He feels his heart beat under her palm, and her warmth pressed against him, and he leans around to kiss her.  

He closes his eyes again, suddenly exhausted from just that minor interaction. “Sleepy,” he mumbles.  

“Go to sleep, Bear,” she says, and reaches up and strokes his hair. “I - I love you,” she whispers into his ear.

“I love you, too,” he mumbles, and the world goes dark around him.  

Kravitz licks his ice cream. It’s mint choc chip.  

He’s not sure when he last had ice cream. It’s not really something alien hunters do a whole lot, but apparently  Taako’s  never had it, so Kravitz had just  had  to get some for him.  

He keeps asking the shopkeeper to try different flavours, and Kravitz would normally be cringing but something about the way he’s so excited to try even standard flavours like vanilla is endearing. Finally, he settles on a pistachio. Angus gets caramel. Kravitz pays, leaving a sizeable tip for the server’s patience.  

They sit in silence for a minute. Angus is trying to read a book with one hand while he eats the ice cream with the other. Taako’s just watching people as they walk past, but Kravitz is watching Taako from the corner of his eye.  

“So, this is, like. The second time we’ve been out like this, now,” he says, quietly so Angus won’t hear. Taako hums in agreement. “I wanted to ask, uh, is this business or pleasure? I mean, I – I know Angus is here, so it can’t be called romantic, but -”  

Taako  shrugs. Kravitz is pretty sure that he’s deliberately schooling his face to look nonchalant. “Depends.”  

Kravitz waits a second for him to elaborate. “On what?” He asks, when it’s obvious Taako isn’t going to.  

“On what your boss is  gonna  do with us when this is all over,” Taako says. “Maybe I’m in the market for a boyfriend, but, y’know, not if she’s gonna lock us up. Or assign us new identities and put us in witness protection.”  Taako  takes a big lick of his ice cream, pointedly not looking at Kravitz.  

“She won’t lock you up,” he answers. The witness protection thing  is  a real possibility, though. “And, you know, I  am  an agent. I’m sure I could be put on your protective detail if she does give you a new identity.”  

Taako  hums. “And then I’d be dating my guardian angel?”  

Kravitz laughs. “I guess so. I mean – obviously, if you don’t want that, I -”  

“Krav, don’t even sweat it. That sounds pretty good to me,” he says. “So,  y’know , maybe we should go for dinner without the brat.”  

Angus looks up, clearly having been listening in the whole time, and he frowns. “Sir, I want to come for dinner too.”  

Kravitz can feel himself flushing; he hadn’t thought Angus could hear!  Taako  doesn’t seem remotely  embarrassed , though, saying, “I’ll make you some before we go, pumpkin. Coq au van, your favourite. How’s that sound? Is it enough to stop you using those detective skills to track us on our date?”  

Angus squints. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”  

Taako  scowls and ruffles the kid’s hair. “You don’t even know what that means, kid. You’re a baby.”  

Kravitz manages to get over his embarrassment, and he smiles. “It’s a date,” he says.  

Lup  and  Taako  kneel, their hands cuffed behind their backs. Edward is chained down, too, a gag in his mouth. Lucretia stands between them, her staff in her hand.  

They’re in an enormous warehouse, filled with wooden crates and metal boxes. Angus had been underwhelmed until he’d seen the spaceship, partially disassembled, lying in the middle of a cleared-out area, and realised that each of these crates contains some alien technology. It’s pretty much everything he’d had wanted the Bureau to be; it’s pretty badass, like something out of Indiana Jones. Barry’s there, too, watching from the sidelines, still looking a bit weak, and Kravitz, Killian and Carey are flanking the Director.  

“Okay, start it up,” Lucretia calls. “We’re ready.”  

The man introduced to Angus as  Avi  nods, and he tinkers with the control panel of the small ship the Bureau had captured. It’s Edward and Lydia’s;  Lup  and  Taako’s  ship had been too badly damaged to use, but luckily Edward had told them where they could find his, and how to use it.  

A blue light blinks on the panel, and  Avi  hits a few more buttons, and finally, the viewscreen comes on.  

A male elf’s face fills the screen. “Edward, report -” There’s a beat as the elf takes in the scene. “Who  are  you? What is this?”  

Lucretia steps forward. “I’m authorised to speak for Earth. If you’re not authorised to speak for the Court, find me someone who is. Immediately.” Her voice brokers no argument.  

The elf immediately disappears from the screen.  There are  a few minutes of silence, and Angus starts to wonder if maybe the elf isn’t coming back, but then a different elf, a woman, this time, steps into view.  

“Speak,” she says.  

“Four of your citizens entered our space without authority. These citizens have been tried and sentenced to death,” Lucretia says. “We understand that two of them, however, are agents of some kind of police force. We have, therefore, commuted their sentences to merely extradition. If we ever see any more of your agents again, they will be summarily executed.”  

The female elf doesn’t move for a long time. It feels, to Angus, like hours, but eventually she speaks. "You will execute our two fugitives? It is entirely unacceptable that they remain alive.”  

Lucretia nods. “They violated a number of our laws.”  

“And you will return both ships – our agents’, and the one stolen by the runaways. As well as any other technology you have seized.”  

“The one stolen by the runaways has been impounded. It is important evidence in the case against them. The other technology is ours. We have a rule on earth –  finders  keepers. We are, however, willing to return your agents’ ship.”  

The female elf scowls, clearly thinking things over, but eventually she nods. “Your terms are agreeable. I cannot help but notice, however, that you only have three prisoners.”  

“One of your agents has, thus far, evaded our capture. This will be rectified.”  

The female elf nods. “Understood. We will send a team in two earth weeks to reclaim our agents and their technology.”  

She waves a hand, and the feed cuts. The call is over. Kravitz immediately steps forward to un-cuff  Lup  and  Taako , who stand, rubbing their wrists. They pointedly leave Edward kneeling.  

“What did we tell you, madame D?”  Lup  says. “The plan worked flawlessly. We  knew  they’d negotiate if you came from a position of strength.”  

Lucretia smiles. “It did, didn’t it? Now all that’s left is to find Lydia in the next two weeks, and, thankfully, our prisoner has given us some idea of where she might be.” She looks at  Lup  and  Taako . “That leaves us with only one more thing to wrap up – what to do with you two.”  

“If you’re going to make us new identities, please can Barry come with us?”  Lup  asks. “That’s all I ask.”  

Lucretia smiles. “We’re not going to give you  new  identities. What we are going to do is offer you a job.” Both twins look confused, so she continues. “We’re always looking for new agents to help find and collect alien artifacts, and now it seems as though that job description has been expanded to hunt for Lydia. Who better to find an alien than two aliens? The same goes for you, mister Hallwinter. You lived with an alien for two months, you’re one of the foremost alien experts on the planet right now.”  

Barry looks nervous. “Oh, that’s a lot of pressure. Uh.”  

There’s the Barry Kravitz remembers.  

“Well, listen. You don’t have to take the job right now. Think on it -”  

Before she can even finish,  Taako  grins. He looks at Lup, and they both turn to the Director.  

“Where do we sign up?”